Canadian spy agency reports hacking three criminal groups in 2025

Canadian intelligence officials executed state-authorized hacks against a ransomware gang, drug dealers and violent extremists in 2025.

The three separate hacks — revealed in a report released last week by the country’s NSA-equivalent Communications Security Establishment (CSE) — were “active cyber operations” on foreign groups posing a threat to Canada, according to the report.

One of the operations used data pulled from devices connected to the internet to disrupt the operations of an unspecified foreign extremist group “spreading violent ideology and seeking to recruit in Western countries, including Canada,” the report said.

The spy agency “successfully undermined the group’s credibility and limited their ability to radicalize and recruit new members,” according to the report.

CSE also went after cybercriminals overseas who were helping sell chemicals used to make fentanyl, a powerful opiate that has killed tens of thousands annually in North America.  The agency said its hack “disrupted and diminished” the traffickers.

A third operation used signals intelligence to map out the inner workings of an unspecified ransomware-as-a-service gang, disrupting the malware users’ ability to extort victims. 

The operation “rendered the group’s infrastructure inoperable and deleted a large amount of stolen data that was being advertised for sale on the dark web,” the report said.

The agency also said it carried out “authorized technical disruptions” against 10 major ransomware gangs to “make parts of their infrastructure unusable” last year.