{"id":160663,"date":"2026-09-06T18:30:21","date_gmt":"2026-09-06T18:30:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/160663\/"},"modified":"2026-09-06T18:30:21","modified_gmt":"2026-09-06T18:30:21","slug":"hackers-demand-2-million-in-bitcoin-from-germany-berlin-refuses-to-pay","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/160663\/","title":{"rendered":"Hackers Demand $2 Million in Bitcoin from Germany. Berlin Refuses to Pay"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Berlin&#8217;s state government refused a 30 Bitcoin ransom, and the hackers behind the attack published 5.7 terabytes of stolen data on the dark web.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">The Rhysida ransomware group had opened the auction at 30 BTC. Berlin let the deadline pass instead of paying.<\/p>\n<p>Why the Bitcoin Ransom Demand Failed<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Rhysida, a ransomware crew active since 2023, offered the files to the highest bidder. Bidding started at 30 BTC.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Bitcoin (BTC) trades near $79,902 per coin. Therefore, 30 coins come to roughly $2.4 million. Berlin&#8217;s Senate Chancellery put the demand at about two million euros.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">BTC has added 0.46% today and 24.4% over the past month. That climb raised the dollar value of the demand while the ultimatum ran.<\/p>\n<p><img alt=\"Bitcoin Price Chart. Source: BeInCrypto\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"960\" height=\"321\" decoding=\"async\" data-nimg=\"1\" class=\"rounded-lg\" style=\"color:transparent\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/https:\/\/media.zenfs.com\/en\/beincrypto_us_662\/b56d88aa860641864349629ec8154f95.png\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Bitcoin Price Chart. Source: BeInCrypto<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Florian Hauer, the city&#8217;s chief digital officer, ruled out any payment.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">&#8220;The State of Berlin will not give in to blackmail. The safety of the State of Berlin&#8217;s staff and the people of Berlin is our top priority.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">The Bitcoin ransom deadline ran out on Friday, September 4. Rhysida published the full dataset that afternoon.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Berlin&#8217;s refusal tracks a broader shift. On-chain ransomware payments fell about 8% in 2025, even as claimed attacks rose 50%.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Subscribe to our YouTube channel to watch leaders and journalists provide expert insights<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Will AI Make Western Democracies Extinct?\" width=\"1200\" height=\"675\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/u2msuT0YoLg?start=78&amp;feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Berlin Counts the Cost of a Dark Web Auction<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">The attack surfaced on August 14. Berlin then cut two Senate departments from the state network. One covers urban development and housing; the other covers mobility, transport, and the environment.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Housing benefit payments and family support stalled until both departments returned on August 23. Officials have warned that residents&#8217; personal data could be in the leak.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">A central crisis unit now reviews the material Rhysida released once the Bitcoin ransom went unpaid. Forensic specialists comb through the files around the clock.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">The State Criminal Police Office and Germany&#8217;s federal cybersecurity agency lead the investigation. Officials told residents to report fraud or identity theft to police.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Berliners elect a new state parliament on September 20, two weeks after the Bitcoin ransom expired.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Rhysida collected nothing. Berlin has not put a figure on the damage, and the review of the published files continues.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Read the Original story <a data-ylk=\"slk:Hackers Demand $2 Million in Bitcoin from Germany. Berlin Refuses to Pay;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas;\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;link&quot;,&quot;yLinkElementType&quot;:&quot;article_link&quot;}\" href=\"https:\/\/beincrypto.com\/bitcoin-ransom-berlin-rhysida-data-leak\/\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" target=\"_blank\">Hackers Demand $2 Million in Bitcoin from Germany. Berlin Refuses to Pay<\/a> by Phil Haunhorst at <a data-ylk=\"slk:beincrypto.com;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas;\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;link&quot;,&quot;yLinkElementType&quot;:&quot;article_link&quot;}\" href=\"https:\/\/beincrypto.com\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" target=\"_blank\">beincrypto.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Berlin&#8217;s state government refused a 30 Bitcoin ransom, and the hackers behind the attack published 5.7 terabytes of&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":160664,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[99],"tags":[112,7773,75368,13144,190,73323,75369],"class_list":["post-160663","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-berlin","tag-berlin","tag-bitcoin","tag-bitcoin-price-chart","tag-btc","tag-germany","tag-rhysida","tag-the-state-criminal-police-office"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@dk\/117225522882649570","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/160663","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=160663"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/160663\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/160664"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=160663"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=160663"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=160663"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}