Supermarkets across Europe were hit Monday by a new wave of apparent cyberattacks affecting fridges and freezers. The incidents caused temperature spikes and spoiled food at stores in Sweden, the Netherlands, Belgium, Ireland, Luxembourg, and Estonia. It follows a cyberattack in France last month, in which police said hackers seized control of cooling units at hundreds of supermarkets, raising temperatures as high as 122 degrees Fahrenheit and causing fires and food losses.
Authorities have not indicated who could have been behind the incidents. There were no claims of responsibility. The issues come as the continent confronts broader security fears stemming from Russia’s war in Ukraine.
The new cyberattack highlights how digital threats can increasingly affect citizens’ everyday lives, the European Commission said Monday. The Ahold Delhaize supermarket chain in the Netherlands told NBC News on Monday that it was aware of an “IT incident” affecting the refrigeration systems in a number of its stores. Stephan Moelans, the CEO of Belgian refrigeration company Sabcobel, which operates Delhaize’s systems, told the Belga news agency that the incident was a cyberattack, in which the units’ evaporators were switched to defrost mode.
A spokesperson for Colruyt Group, which operates Spar stores in Belgium under a franchise system, said five shops had their fridge systems attacked. The Carrefour supermarket chain in the country said a “cyberattack targeting refrigeration installations only had an extremely limited impact,” affecting 15 of its more than 700 stores. Sweden’s grocery retailer chain ICA told NBC News its systems were not affected, but that it had been informed of “an incident at a small number of stores that use an external supplier and have their connectivity outside ICA’s central network.” The incident has affected the stores’ refrigeration and freezer systems, the company said in an email.
The ICA Kvantum branch in Sjöbo in southern Sweden wrote on its Facebook page that its fridges and freezers had been hacked and set to 122 degrees Fahrenheit. It said it was working to discard the affected items. Privately held grocery retail group Coop told Swedish daily Aftonbladet that six of its stores had been affected by similar incidents.
In Ireland, food wholesaler Musgrave said that a cyber incident had affected refrigeration systems in 13 of its SuperValu stores, forcing it to remove some chilled and frozen products from sale. In Estonia, a company that makes the affected technology said that one of its clients had been hit by a cyberattack in which attackers accessed a computer controlling refrigeration and also turned up the temperature to 122 degrees Fahrenheit, public broadcaster ERR reported. From refrigerators and heating systems to security cameras and alarm networks, an expanding range of devices can now be monitored and controlled remotely, creating new opportunities for cybercriminals.
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