Swift action by CERT-EU contained the breach within nine hours, linked to critical Ivanti software flaws (CVE-2026-1281 and CVE-2026-1340).
The European Commission has confirmed that its central systems were targeted in a cyber attack that may have exposed the personal details of its staff. According to the European Commission’s official press release, on 30 January 2026, the organisation detected signs of an intrusion within the systems used to manage employee mobile phones and tablets. For your information, this type of software, known as Mobile Device Management, is used by large groups to control apps and security settings on many devices at once.
Reportedly, the Commission’s central mobile infrastructure was compromised. Though they did not name the specific software provider, the incident occurred exactly a day after Ivanti warned of two critical flaws in its Ivanti Endpoint Manager Mobile (EPMM).
These flaws, tracked as CVE-2026-1281 and CVE-2026-1340, are code injection issues. Simply put, they allow a hacker to send a malicious command to the system, which the software then accidentally runs as if it were a legitimate instruction. This allows an attacker to take control of the server remotely without ever needing a username or password.
Swift Action Taken to Protect Data
The Commission acted quickly to stop the spread of the attack. The systems were secured and cleaned within just nine hours of the discovery. While the hackers may have seen names and phone numbers, the Commission stated that “no compromise of mobile devices was detected.” This suggests that while the central “control room” for the phones was accessed, the actual handheld devices belonging to staff remained safe.
European institutions, as we know it, are frequent targets for digital threats. The Commission was not alone in this struggle. Similar attacks recently hit government bodies in the Netherlands and Finland. For instance, Valtori, a Finnish government agency, reported a breach that could potentially affect up to 50,000 users. Meanwhile, the security watchdog Shadowserver found that dozens of other servers worldwide were likely hit by the same software flaw.
Boosting Europe’s Digital Defences
It is worth noting that this incident occurred just ten days after the Commission introduced the Cybersecurity Act 2.0 on 20 January. This new plan aims to make the EU more resilient against large-scale attacks. Agencies such as CERT-EU work 24/7 to monitor these threats and help neutralise them before they can be exploited. The Commission has promised a full review of the hack to learn how to better protect its data in the future.
Expert Analysis
In a comment shared with Hackread.com, David Neeson, Deputy SOC Team Lead at Barrier Networks, expressed concerns over how these software flaws are being handled. He noted that while the Commission reported no major impact, the situation raises “worrying questions surrounding current EPMM deployments.” Here’s Neeson’s full comment.
“While the European Commission hasn’t reported any substantial impacts from this breach, it does raise several worrying questions surrounding current EPMM deployments.
Ivanti has not released a full set of fixes for the EPMM flaws, instead issuing patches while they work on a comprehensive fix in the coming months. It’s not clear whether these had been applied to the EC’s EPMM deployments, and it’s worrying if not, given that the patches wouldn’t have required downtime to apply.
However, the security patches issued by Ivanti will revert when updating to different versions of the software, and customers also require different patches in order to target different versions of EPMM. This may be technically required and a necessary expedient, but it’s a fragmented approach to fixing such severe flaws and arguably leaves customers at substantial risk, much more than a comprehensive update would. Ivanti says that it’s working on such an update, but fixes for these issues alone should warrant something more immediate.
This form of attack ultimately relies on speed and on catching targets off-guard. It may be the case that patching was in progress on the EC’s systems, but not applied across all the organisation’s devices, in which case attackers would have been able to access at least some systems.
The attack also appears highly targeted, affecting only a small number of Ivanti’s customers; the targeting of bodies like the EC could indicate the threat actors are working for political ends. The attackers are no doubt highly motivated, and any other government agencies currently using EPMM, both in the EU and abroad, should ensure their deployments are patched immediately.
Ivanti has also issued an RPM tool designed to aid in the detection of EPMM breaches, which the company recommends customers run alongside normal security protocols. While this isn’t a preventative, it should at least give a firm indication of specific signals related to the exploitation of these flaws, and customers should make use of this if they suspect a breach has occurred.”
Deeba Ahmed
