Oil facilities at Belgian ports have been hit with a cyberattack. The news comes a day after Germany launched an investigation into a similar incident.

As EU ally Ukraine reels from a massive cyberattack on government websites, the EU Commissioner for Innovation, Research, Culture, Education and Youth tells FRANCE 24 that this kind of attack should not come as a surprise. "We should not be surprised but we have to be ready to act. That means more co-ordination and more joint actions between member states," Mariya Gabriel said.

A widespread cyberattack has hit gas stations and billboards across Iran, halting some fuel sales. Billboards have been altered to anti-regime messages challenging Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

US IT company Kaseya urged its customers to shut down their servers after hackers smuggled ransomware onto its network. Such attacks infiltrate widely-used software and demand ransom to regain access.

The Brazilian multinational JBS has closed plants in Australia, Canada and the US, driving livestock futures down, pork prices up and sparking global food supply fears.

DarkSide, a group of veteran cybercriminals, is believed to be behind the ransomware attack on Colonial Pipeline, the worst cyberattack on critical US infrastructure to date.

In a tweet posted on February 11, the Center Hospitalier de Dax-Côte d'Argent revealed that it had fallen prey to a cyber-attack and was trying to restore systems that included the telephone switchboard.

The recent US cyberattack against Iranian weapons systems is just the latest example of how conflicts are spilling into the virtual sphere. Germany, however, is hesitant to join the digital arms race. DW investigates.