Hackers threaten to leak 'top-secret' data after French navy attack

The naval giant says it is investigating whether or not the data dump is legitimate. (Image: Getty)

Hackers claiming to have carried out a major cyber attack against the French naval giant Naval Group, releasing 30 gigabytes of data, have threatened to continue leaking key military information.

French military shipbuilder Naval Group, known for manufacturing submarines and frigates, rejects the hacking claims, confirming it had “immediately launched technical investigations” after material surfaced online.

The alleged data leak claims to feature sensitive data about the NATO member's nuclear submarines.

State-owned Naval Group produces France's Suffren-class submarine, nuclear-powered and nuclear-armed attack submarines capable of carrying out anti-surface and anti-submarine warfare, land attacks, and other special operations.

With a history which can be traced back 400 years to the reign of Louis XIII, Naval Group also produced the French Navy's flagship, and sole active aircraft carrier, the Charles de Gaulle.

Posting to a dark web forum, hackers claimed to be in possession of “top-secret classified” data for “submarines and frigates”, giving the company 72 hours to respond to the claim, adding documents alleging to include source code for submarine weapon systems.

Roughly 30GB of data was posted by the cyber criminals, though they claim to have much more information available to them, potentially one terabyte of documents.

Naval Group insisted there had been “no intrusion into our IT environments”, adding it was the target of a “reputational attack”.

As France's largest shipbuilder, the company, which the French government owns almost two-thirds of, employs more than 15,000 workers, generating revenues of more than €4.4bn.

“Naval Group has noticed being the target of a reputational attack with the claim of a cyber-malice act. We immediately launched technical investigations," A spokesperson said.

Leaked documents allege to contain source code for submarine weapon systems. (Image: Getty)

“All teams and resources are currently mobilised to analyse and verify the authenticity, origin and ownership of the data as quickly as possible.

“At this stage, no intrusion into our IT environments has been detected and there has been no impact on our activities.”

Several data breaches have been reported across the world, with both commercial companies and governments falling victim to cyber attacks.

Last week, Microsoft that a July software updates didn't fully fix a couple of bugs, allowing hackers to take over on-premises SharePoint servers and remotely execute code, which the tech firm put down to Chinese "threat actors".

Elsewhere, the US National Nuclear Security Administration, responsible for America’s nuclear arsenal, was targeted recently but insists no sensitive files have been taken.