Cybercriminals successfully hacked a messaging app on the phone of German Bundestag President Julia Klöckner, the second-highest ranking official in Germany, according to a report by Der Spiegel. Klöckner is among the victims of a phishing-style cyberattack that targeted the Signal app, a popular messaging service used by European politicians for secure communication.

Cyberattack Methodology and Targets

The attack involved a phishing-style campaign where hackers posed as a fake Signal support chatbot to trick users into revealing their PIN codes. According to Der Spiegel, the attack affected at least one other CDU lawmaker and a Signal group chat that includes Chancellor Friedrich Merz and members of the CDU executive board. Germany’s domestic intelligence service and European cybersecurity agencies had previously issued warnings about such attacks, with the European Commission recommending officials use Signal since 2020.

Alemania sospecha que Rusia está detrás de los ataques, según fuentes gubernamentales citadas por Der Spiegel. Un portavoz del Ministerio del Interior confirmó que “estos ataques están probablemente llevados a cabo por un actor cibernético respaldado por un Estado, y la información actual muestra que la campaña sigue activa y está ampliándose.”

Julia Klöckner’s Political Role and Background

Julia Klöckner was elected President of the German Bundestag on March 25, 2025, and is the fourth woman to hold the position; she represents the conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and was first elected to the Bundestag in 2002. As President, she presides over parliamentary sessions, sets the agenda, and ensures parliamentary order, though her role is the second-most important in Germany after the Federal President and precedes the Chancellor and the President of the Bundesrat.

Klöckner was born on December 16, 1972, in Bad Kreuznach and grew up on her family’s vineyard along the Nahe River. She has been a prominent political figure for over two decades and has held various ministerial roles, including Minister of Food and Agriculture from 2017 to 2021.

Policy Initiatives and Controversies

In 2022, as Minister of Food and Agriculture, Klöckner oversaw the implementation of stricter animal welfare policies. These included regulations requiring dog owners to spend at least four hours daily with their pets, mandatory twice-daily walks of at least one hour, and restrictions on commercial breeding. Failure to comply with these regulations can result in fines or even imprisonment.

And, Klöckner played a key role in banning the culling of male chicks in the egg industry, a controversial practice where male chicks are destroyed shortly after hatching. In January 2022, she announced that Germany would become the first country to outlaw this practice by 2022, using a new technology developed by the German company Seleggt to identify the sex of eggs before hatching.

The Bundestag administration has declined to comment on the recent cyberattack, stating it generally does not provide information on security-critical infrastructure — the CDU has not yet responded to inquiries about the incident.