Overnight cyberattacks have forced supermarkets in at least seven European countries to throw away large amounts of food after hackers took control of their cooling systems. In several affected stores, attackers remotely turned the temperature in refrigerators and freezers up to 50°C (122°F), leaving food spoiled and unsellable.
Retailers in Belgium, Estonia, Finland, Ireland, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, and Sweden reported problems on Monday morning. In Sweden, store managers reported destroyed goods after systems were breached in the middle of the night. In Belgium, technicians worked through the night to disconnect cooling units after hackers switched them into defrost mode. Customers in affected shops arrived to find empty shelves and signs apologizing for the disruption.
The incidents follow an attack in France last month, where hackers raised temperatures in up to 700 supermarkets and caused millions of euros in damage. European Union officials described the latest strikes as a deliberate attempt to disrupt the food supply chain. Because the attackers made no financial demands, cybersecurity experts believe the goal was simple sabotage, warning that thousands of store cooling systems connected to the internet still lack basic security updates.