Brussels (Belgium) (AFP) - The European Union warned Monday of attempts to target food supply chains, after grocery stores in several countries witnessed a rise in temperatures inside refrigeration units, in suspected cyber attacks similar to those that targeted France in October.

Published on: 02/11/2026 - 19:25 Last updated: 02/11/2026 - 20:48

The latest attack, attributed to hackers, affected stores in at least nine countries: Belgium, Estonia, Finland, Ireland, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Sweden, Portugal, and Italy, forcing them to get rid of food that was damaged or was at risk of spoilage.

The largest retail companies in France announced on October 12 that hundreds of refrigeration systems in their stores had been subjected to a cyber attack, forcing them to throw away large quantities of food. No group has claimed responsibility for last month's attack or the attacks that occurred Monday.

European Union Commissioner for Food and Agriculture, Christoph Hansen, said that the bloc takes these incidents “very seriously,” describing the repeated attacks as “deeply worrying.”

He saw it as "a deliberate attempt to disrupt our food supply chain and undermine consumer confidence in it, and it serves as a warning that we must take seriously."

The unrest centered on Monday in Belgium, where the authorities announced the opening of an investigation, without conclusively confirming that what happened were electronic hacking attacks. However, some of the affected parties were decisive in confirming the circumstances of the incidents.

The Carrefour chain in Belgium announced a disruption in about 15 of its 700 stores. Its spokesman, Mich Verguin, said: “It is a cyber attack. There is no other reason.”

An IKEA Belgium spokeswoman also said that a cyber attack targeted the chain's branch in Mons, in the southwest of the country, which led to a sudden rise in refrigerator temperatures in the early hours of the morning.

Retail chains Delhaize, Colruyt and Intermarche also reported that the cooling systems in their stores were affected by technical problems. Delhaize announced that four of its stores in Luxembourg were also affected.

The Belgian group "Sabcobel", which specializes in industrial cooling systems, said that it began securing its facilities after the attack in France, but about 10% of the systems had not yet been updated, and some of them were in the affected stores on Monday.

Musgrave Group, which owns the Super Value chain in Ireland, announced that 13 of its stores were damaged. A limited number of small stores in the Netherlands were also affected.

In Portugal, the Mosqueteros group confirmed incidents in seven stores belonging to Intermarche, linked to a cyber attack. She said that it "apparently targeted an external service provider responsible for managing cooling systems," noting that investigations are still ongoing.

In Sweden, the Cobb chain confirmed that six of its nearly 800 stores had been subjected to a cyber attack on Monday morning.

Its spokesman, Carlos Cansino, told AFP, “We confirm that it is a cyber incident. The problem has now been resolved and the refrigerators and freezers have returned to operating normally.”

He explained that the affected stores were connected to the fourth generation (4G) communications network and not to the updated fifth generation (5G) system, which made them “more vulnerable” to hacking.

"exploit vulnerabilities"

The Swedish "Ika" chain also reported that a "limited number" of its stores faced problems with cooling systems, but it was unable to confirm that they were caused by a cyber attack.

According to company spokeswoman Helena Johansson, all the affected stores were connected to an external cooling control system provided by the Danish company Danfoss, the same company whose system was targeted in the cyber attack that targeted French stores last month.

Danfoss did not respond to AFP's request for comment.

One of the "Ika" stores in the city of Šoppo in southern Sweden posted on Facebook that its refrigerators and freezers "were hacked and the temperature was set to 50 degrees Celsius."

In Finland, abnormal temperatures were also observed in a number of small grocery stores belonging to the Kesco group.

"We are currently investigating the cause, and the possibility of network interference has not yet been ruled out," said Petri Kayhko, the group's head of corporate security.

For his part, Ronnie Kokkola, an information security specialist at the National Cybersecurity Center of the Finnish Transport and Communications Agency "Traficom", did not rule out the hypothesis of electronic interference in Finland.

He said, "We have witnessed similar cases in Europe during the past few months, so it was expected that the matter would extend to other countries outside France," adding, "It has become common today to exploit various types of vulnerabilities at an increasing and rapid pace."

In Italy, local media reported that the National Cybersecurity Agency received notification of an incident from a company operating in the catering sector located in the Tuscany region. The agency also monitored an attack targeting a company specializing in frozen foods in the Emilia-Romagna region.

The agency recommended verifying the extent to which remote control and technical support systems are connected to the Internet, and working to isolate them with the aim of reducing the risks of hacking and preventing hackers from accessing sensitive industrial systems or controlling them remotely.

In Estonia, at least one store was subjected to a cyber attack that raised the temperature of refrigeration units to 50 degrees Celsius, according to public broadcaster ERR.

Jan Mutsu, director of Keetman Coldtech, a manufacturer and distributor of advanced cooling systems, said the targeted units were old models produced by Danfoss, similar to those targeted in last month's attack.

Following the attack in the sector in France, Danfoss explained to Agence France-Presse that most of the damaged equipment was old products that “no longer receive software or security updates.”

© 2026 AFP

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