Polish Grid Hack Underlines European Need for Active Defense

Russian Hacking Shows Limits of Preventive Measures David Meyer • January 30, 2026

Europe must step up its active defenses against cyberattacks and modernize its IT infrastructure, a leading expert has warned in the wake of a major attack on Poland's energy grid attributed to Russian hackers.

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The region is already moving to beef up the security of its critical infrastructure through somewhat uneven implementation of the 2022 Network and Information Security 2 Directive. But that's only half the battle, said Haya Schulmann, chair for cybersecurity of the Institute of Computer Science at Goethe University in Frankfurt, and a board member of Germany's Athene, formerly known as the National Research Center for Applied Cybersecurity.

"A country nowadays cannot focus solely on preventative protection," Schulmann told Information Security Media Group in ...