Poland Reports Sharp Rise in Espionage Investigations, Attributes Increase to Russia

Com reported. The agency said Russia is moving away from low-cost one-time recruits toward more professional operations that tap into organized crime networks. European officials and law enforcement have warned that Russia is waging a hybrid war against Europe that includes sabotage, arson attacks, vandalism, and influence operations.

The Associated Press has tracked more than 150 incidents linked to Moscow by Western officials since the invasion of Ukraine. Many people involved in the incidents were recruited online as disposable agents, and some had no idea they were working for Moscow.

Poland has conducted as many espionage investigations in the past two years as it did over the previous three decades, with 62 people arrested.

In 2024 and 2025, 69 espionage investigations were initiated, the same total number as between 1991 and 2023. "The long-term goal of the Russian Federation remains the disintegration of Euro-Atlantic structures, the isolation of specific countries and their internal socio-political and economic destabilization," the report stated.

While Poland was primarily targeted by Russia, some of the espionage activities were dictated by Belarus' secret services, which are closely cooperating with Moscow, as well as by China.

Mass surveillance operations in Poland are meant to set the ground for acts of diversion, which the agency considers the most serious challenge it faces. Russian intelligence services escalating their actions in Poland are accepting the possibility of occurrence of fatalities. There has been increasing professionalization of Russian sabotage activities in 2024-2025.

In 2023, Russian services were still basing their operations mainly on one-time agents recruited ad hoc via the internet. In November 2025, explosions and other malfunctions on a section of railway line used for deliveries to Ukraine affected two trains, including a passenger train. Prime Minister Donald Tusk called the November 2025 railway incident an unprecedented act of sabotage.

There were no casualties in the November 2025 railway sabotage incident.