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Austria Now News – Brussels
Cybercriminals have once again targeted refrigeration systems in European stores, with attackers in Belgium and Sweden causing fridges and freezers to heat up, the news agencies Belga and TT reported on Monday. According to information from Reuters, branches in Luxembourg were also affected.
Around 20 facilities affected in Belgium
In Belgium, the damage reportedly affected stores belonging to the Delhaize, Carrefour and Spar chains. Belga quoted refrigeration service company Sabcobel as saying that around 20 facilities have been affected so far – a much smaller scale than a similar attack in France in the middle of last month that hit around 150 stores.
According to Sabcobel, the attackers remotely switched the systems to defrost mode. The company’s chairman, Stephan Moelans, said the company had been mobilising technicians since 1 a.m. to bring the situation under control.
Sudden temperature rise in Sweden
In Sweden, too, stores reported a sudden rise in temperature in their refrigeration systems. A spokesperson for the ICA group confirmed to TT that a limited number of branches had been affected overnight by an incident involving refrigeration and freezer systems, without specifying how many. An ICA store in the town of Sjöbo indicated on Facebook that the problems were caused by a hacking attack, which the ICA group did not confirm. Six stores belonging to the Coop chain also reported problems with their refrigeration systems.
Growing risk to infrastructure
The recurrence of these attacks within just a few weeks shows how vulnerable internet-connected technical systems are in the food retail sector, where manipulating temperatures can disrupt store operations.
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Sources
vienna.at citing APA, Chaos in Supermärkten: Schon wieder Cyberattacke auf Kühlanlagen?, 02.11.2026, https://www.vienna.at/chaos-in-supermaerkten-schon-wieder-cyberattacke-auf-kuehlanlagen/10607615
