AfD confirms hosting provider was hacked; email archive published online

Alternative for Germany (AfD) said on October 20, 2026 that it was investigating the online publication of emails stolen during a cyberattack in September 2026 on a hosting service provider used by the party. A party spokesperson said hackers apparently copied data from a small number of email accounts, most of which had not been used for years, that active accounts belonging to the current federal executive board were not affected, and that affected users were informed. The party said the attack was stopped quickly and did not state how much data was stolen.

An anonymous archive site that went online on October 19 claims to hold 421,179 party emails totalling about 281 GB from roughly ten inboxes, including accounts in the names of co-leader Alice Weidel, honorary chairman Alexander Gauland, deputy leader Beatrix von Storch, Jörg Meuthen and Leif-Erik Holm, with material dated from 2014 to September 2026. Bild said it viewed a small part of the material, including a photo of deputy parliamentary group chairman Markus Frohnmaier's identity card, other identity documents, bank statements, invoices, certificates, and North Rhine-Westphalia membership applications and lists. Those archive figures are the site's claims, not a party-confirmed count: the party is still examining whether the published material is authentic and whether it is only a portion of what was copied, and the hosting site was offline by Tuesday afternoon.

Sources: Reuters; Brussels Signal