Supermarket refrigeration systems in Ireland, Sweden, the Netherlands, Finland, Belgium, Luxembourg and Estonia went haywire overnight.
Grocery chain giants are reporting that temperatures inside their fridges and freezers were remotely set to as high as 55°C.
Some shop workers arrived for their morning shifts to discover puddles, melted ice cream and spoilt frozen vegetables which needed to be binned.
Graham Wynn, the assistant director of regulatory affairs at the British Retail Consortium, told Metro that British supermarkets are on alert.
‘Retailers invest heavily in their cybersecurity and are currently working with the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) to ensure their fridges and freezers are as secure as possible against potential attacks,’ he said.
The NCSC told Metro that the agency is working with its European counterparts ‘to fully understand details of an incident.’
Cyber officials are not aware of the suspected freezer hack having any impact on the UK.
‘What shouldn’t have happened has happened!’
Many European supermarkets use software that allows them to remotely control refrigerators, such as defrosting them overnight.
Sabcobel, a Belgian company that manufactures some of the affected refrigerators, said the units had their defrosting features tinkered with.
It told Belga, a Belgian news agency, that the software was hacked and the company was ‘working all night and morning’ to unplug the fridges.
Supervalu, one of Ireland’s largest supermarket chains, has dumped chilled and frozen food from 13 stores so far, according to The Journal.
Swedish grocery giants Axfood and ICA say they have also been hit by the suspected cyberattack.
The manager at the ICA Böda outlet was greeted by a puddle of water when clocking in this morning, SVT reported.
Another location near Sundbergs in Mörlunda said it has also been impacted and will be ‘closed until further notice’.
ICA Kvantum Sjöbo shared several photographs on Facebook showing freezer aisles dark.
‘What shouldn’t have happened has happened!’ it said.
‘Our refrigerators and freezers have been hacked during the night and they have set the temperature to 50°C.
‘We are extremely sad and are working hard to get everything back up and running.’
ICA is investigating the incident, which it says has impacted a ‘limited number of stores’.
Why are so many freezers across the world being hacked?
During the fridge cyber attack in France, most of the targeted cooling systems were outdated and no longer received software updates.
In other words, they’re an easy target, Tom Hegel, a threat researcher for the cybersecurity firm SentinelOne, tells Metro.
‘Once an attacker can operate those controls, legitimate functions such as defrosting become tools for disruption,’ he says. ‘Changing a setting can destroy physical stock, not just interrupt a computer system.’
But why, of all things, would hackers target refrigeration management systems?
James Stanley, head of engineering at the tech company WITTENSTEIN High Integrity Systems, wouldn’t blame you for thinking this,
‘Food retailers are part of critical national infrastructure, and attackers know this,’ Stanley says.
‘Disrupting these systems can cause massive financial damage for stores, and more broadly, create nationwide hysteria at a time of increased focus on national cybersecurity.’
Today, it’s refrigeration systems. Tomorrow, it could be air-conditioning units, building controls of factory equipment, adds Alan Simpson, field CISO at the cybersecurity platform Rapid7.
‘Wherever remote access lets someone change how machines run, weak security can lead to real-world disruption,’ he says.
‘The consequences are catastrophic’
In Belgium, freezers and refrigerators at dozens of Delhaize, Carrefour, Intermarché and Spar have also been cranked up, according to RTL Info.
The attack began at around midnight, impacting the software that allows retailers to remotely defrost units.
Diego Louwers, manager of the Proxy Delhaize in Overijse, told the Belgian news outlet he arrived at 3.20am to find the freezers ‘blowing out hot air’.
‘The consequences are catastrophic because we have to throw away all of our merchandise that is no longer at the correct temperature. That is to say, all fresh and frozen products,’ he said.
Delhaize reportedly sent a text to store managers at 4am to warn them that an ‘IT incident’ had impacted the cooling systems.
In at least 40 locations, refrigerator and freezer temperatures reached around 15°C.
Carrefour reported that 15 stores have been affected, with Intermarché and Spar at 15 and five sites, respectively.
Dutch media reported that Delhaize stores in Luxembourg are also out of service.
Jann Mutso, CEO of the Estonian refrigeration company Kitman Coldtech, said supermarkets using its tech have been hacked.
He did not tell ERR which sites were impacted but stressed it was dealt with ‘within 10 minutes of being reported, meaning no damage was caused’.
Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.
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