Berlin blackout or how power works in the information age

When large parts of Berlin lost electricity, it wasn’t just a technical failure. According to reporting by Berlin Story (https://www.berlinstory.de/news/stromausfall-in-berlin-kyrillische-fehler-im-text/), the incident also fits a broader pattern of disruption that combines attacks on infrastructure with confusion in the information space.

What mattered most was what followed the collapse of electricity supply.

Suddenly, basic life stopped. For me, the blackout meant five days without light, heating, warm water, a functioning kitchen - and no internet or mobile connection. Our fireplace was the only reason we could stay at home at all (the pic might look cosy, but imagine about 15 degrees Celsius in that room).

At the same time, stories about the cause of the attack spread fast - foreign involvement, extremist groups, counter-claims - alongside highly emotive but rather irrelevant side narratives, such as the public focus on the Berlin mayor playing tennis during the crisis. Attention fragmented before a shared factual baseline could form. While narratives multiplied, verifying anything became impossible, because the blackout itself had taken away access to information.

This is the core problem Alexander Seger describes as “flooding the zone” (link to his discussion paper: https://substack.com/inbox/post/183058278?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&triedRedirect=true): When facts are hard to establish and many competing stories circulate at once, uncertainty takes over. People don’t stop caring. They stop knowing whom to trust and - as a result - democratic resilience is weakened. When shared facts disappear, societies become more open to simple answers and strong authority - order instead of freedom, certainty instead of debate.

The lesson is simple but uncomfortable ⚠️ Protecting democracy today is not only about elections or institutions. It is about keeping basic infrastructure, information access and trust intact.

This is now a test of delivery 🛡️ We must treat information integrity and infrastructure resilience as core elements of democratic security. That includes a strategic shift towards more decentralised and less failure-prone critical infrastructures, reducing single points of failure and limiting the impact of both physical disruption and information operations. The tools exist (technical as well as legal, including the EU Digital Services Act) - what is required now is political resolve, cross-sector coordination, and disciplined implementation.