France has pointed the finger at Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) for last month's cyber-attacks that manipulated temperatures in supermarket refrigeration units nationwide, destroying tons of chilled and frozen food.
Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot condemned the operation as an unprecedented act of aggression, stating that the government plans to impose sanctions and summoned the Iranian ambassador in Paris to register a strong protest. Iranian media outlets have dismissed the accusations as groundless, while the French government has not publicly detailed how it attributed the incident to Iran.
The intrusion began on October 11 when hackers breached software used to control supermarket cooling systems remotely, a program supplied by Danish engineering firm Danfoss. Over 100 Coopérative U locations and 180 Intermarché and Netto stores were impacted, with some refrigeration units heating up to 50 degrees Celsius overnight. Additional major retailers such as Carrefour, Monoprix, and E.Leclerc also sustained hits.
A Paris prosecutor announced that an investigation has been initiated targeting the head of an offensive cyber unit linked to the IRGC and his two deputies. The unit, identified as Shahid Kaveh, is believed to be affiliated with the electronic and cyber center of the IRGC.
A subsequent wave of similar attacks struck over 100 stores across several other European countries, including Belgium, Luxembourg, Sweden, Ireland, the Netherlands, Estonia, and Finland, though it remains unknown if the incidents are connected. This follows separate reports of food-spoiling fridge malfunctions at a small number of United States military bases in August that are also being investigated as deliberate cyber-attacks.