French authorities on Monday accused hackers aligned with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps of carrying out the cyberattack that disabled refrigeration systems at 700 French grocery stores in early October.
The Paris prosecutor’s office is seeking international arrest warrants for the leader and two deputies of Shahid Kaveh — an IRGC-aligned organized cybercrime group.
Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau announced a formal judicial investigation on Monday, saying the attack had “been committed to serve the interests of a foreign power — in this case, Iran.”
The attack “marks the first large-scale cyberattack aimed at sabotage on our national territory,” French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot said Monday. “We will impose sanctions at the European level against all those responsible for this attack,” he added, vowing to take “any other measures needed” to respond to it and deter future attacks.
The French government’s cybersecurity authority traced multiple IP addresses involved in the cyberattack back to devices located in Iran and found that the hackers organized the operation in Farsi.
Barrot said he had summoned Iran’s ambassador to “strongly protest against this extremely grave act.” Iran has yet to respond to the accusations.
The October 11 cyberattack struck about 700 grocery stores, according to the prosecutor’s office, out of roughly 10,000 nationwide. The hackers seized control of the software that lets retailers remotely manage their refrigerators and freezers, leading to “significant food spoilage” and roughly 20 fires as the temperatures inside the units climbed as high as 122 degrees Fahrenheit.
The hacked systems, primarily made by Danish manufacturer Danfoss, typically undergo a short defrost cycle as part of a nightly routine. Prosecutors said hackers triggered endless defrost cycles and disabled alarms meant to alert staff to the high temperatures.
Two supermarkets in eastern France alone suffered about $302,000 in combined losses, The Daily Wire previously reported.
Les Mousquetaires, which owns the major French grocery chain Intermarché, reported that refrigerators at around 180 of its stores remained at 122 degrees Fahrenheit for about six hours overnight.
Les Mousquetaires CEO Thierry Cotillard estimated that the hack cost French grocery chains “tens of millions of euros” nationwide in a single day.
Danfoss said at the time that almost all hacked units were “legacy” products that “no longer receive software or security updates,” and that it had previously urged French grocery chains to upgrade these models for better security.
Last week, the FBI released a joint fact sheet with four other federal agencies detailing the risk of a similar cyberattack on American grocery stores and cold storage facilities. The agencies urged operators to take at-risk systems off the public internet, warning that poorly managed systems could create fire hazards.
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