“Illegitimate access” to France’s national bank account registry has exposed the data of approximately 1.2 million accounts since the end of January, the Ministry of the Economy announced on Wednesday, February 18.
According to a statement from the ministry, investigations by the General Directorate of Public Finance (DGFiP) identified the unauthorized access to the FICOBA (Fichier des Comptes Bancaires et Assimilés) database.
The breach, which began in late January 2026, involved an attacker who compromised the credentials of a government employee with authorized access to the system. This allowed them to access a portion of the database containing personal and banking information, including account numbers (RIB/IBAN), account holder identities, addresses, and, in some instances, taxpayer identification numbers, according to Bercy. Even though, the ministry indicated that access to account balances was not compromised.
Complaint Filed
Account holders affected by the breach will receive individual notifications in the coming days alerting them to the potential exposure of their data. Banks have too been notified and are advising customers to exercise caution. This incident underscores the growing threat of cyberattacks targeting sensitive financial data.
The ministry stated that immediate measures were taken upon detection of the incident to restrict access, limit the scope of data consulted and extracted, and prevent further unauthorized access. Efforts are currently underway to restore full service with enhanced security protocols.
A formal complaint has been filed, and the incident has been reported to the Commission Nationale de l’Informatique et des Libertés (CNIL), France’s data privacy regulator. The DGFiP’s IT teams, along with the Ministry of Finance and the National Agency for the Security of Information Systems, are fully mobilized to address the incident and strengthen the security of the information system.
