This story is part of a partnership with La French Tech New York and The French Tech Journal. This editorial partnership brings you a deeper look at French innovation as it expands beyond France’s borders, across the United States. Through this collaboration, we’ll share the data points, insights, sector breakthroughs, success stories, and lessons from French founders building across America’s most dynamic tech ecosystems, from New York to San Francisco.
When French Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu walked into the Agence nationale des titres sécurisés on April 30 and called the wave of cyberattacks on the French state "the heist of the century, which is happening practically every month," it was less a press line than an admission.
ANTS, the public agency responsible for issuing identity documents (identity cards, driving licenses, etc.) and registering vehicles, was attacked in mid-April by a hacker who stole files containing personal information. The incident became even more humiliating when authorities arrested and charged a suspect: a 15-year-old who was selling the data on the dark web.
France logs three data thefts a day. In Q1 2026, it ranked second among the most-targeted countries worldwide for data breaches. The Prime Minister announced €200 million in emergency funding to audit ministry vulnerabilities, invest in detection and post-quantum cryptography, and create a new digital authority sitting directly under Matignon.
The latest money follows a €1 billion commitment to cybersecurity originally announced in 2021. That 5-year plan, the National Cybersecurity Strategy, sets audacious targets: triple the sector's revenue from €7.3 billion to €25 billion, double employment from 37,000 to 75,000, and cultivate three French cybersecurity unicorns by 2025.
For French cybersecurity startups, this sense of urgency and spending has an extraordinary tailwind. Funding for French cybersecurity is accelerating, driven also by the growing mix of artificial intelligence as both a threat and an opportunity.
However, beyond these numbers, there was another clear trend within the deals we tracked over the last 18 months: every meaningful round either funded a company already operating in the United States or earmarked capital for getting there.
U.S. expansion has always been the ambition and a high bar for French startups. But now there is the added twist of geopolitics. In Europe and France, sovereignty issues have become paramount, while in the U.S., attitudes have clearly shifted to "America First."
