France blames Iran's Revolutionary Guards for October cyberattacks on supermarket fridges

Mixed · 2On 9 November, French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot said Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) carried out the October 11–12 cyberattacks on French supermarket refrigeration systems, calling the attack "unprecedented in both its scale and its level of aggression". 1 2 Mixed · 2Barrot said the attack targeted 700 sites; the Paris prosecutor's office said it caused "significant food spoilage and triggered roughly twenty fires" as temperatures in refrigeration units shot up. 1 3 Left · 1The prosecutor's office said attackers gained remote control of the equipment through web interfaces, starting indefinite defrost cycles while disabling temperature alerts, and cited use of Farsi and IP addresses tracing to devices in Iran. 3

Mixed · 2Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau opened a judicial investigation targeting the head of "Shahid Kaveh", a cyber unit affiliated with the IRGC's Electronic and Cyber Center, his two deputies and anyone else identified; charges include fraudulent interference with a data-processing system, aggravated by acting to serve a foreign power. 2 3 Right · 1Barrot said France would impose sanctions at European level, had summoned the Iranian ambassador to lodge a "very strong protest", and would take other "necessary and proportionate measures"; EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said "our response should be strong". 1 Mixed · 2Iran did not immediately respond to the allegations; Reuters noted that Iran routinely denies carrying out malicious cyber operations. 2 4

Mixed · 2Similar incidents followed elsewhere: AFP reported that on 2 November grocery stores in at least nine other European countries were hit by a suspected freezer-system cyberattack, while CBS reported hacks in Belgium, Luxembourg and Sweden and an attack that affected French blood banks without damaging products. No official has yet said all incidents are connected. 1 3 Mixed · 2Cybersecurity experts told Reuters the attack appeared easy to carry out, and the manufacturer of many of the units said several were obsolete or ran outdated firmware; the FBI has urged organisations to take such controllers off the public internet. 4 3 Mixed · 2Reuters, citing two people familiar with the matter, described the hacks as among the most disruptive cyberattacks of the war with Iran that began in February; CBS added that Iran has threatened to widen retaliation for the US-launched war and the US naval blockade of its ports. 4 3

Left · 1Separately, one article filed with this story, from ABC News (Australia), is unrelated: the ACT Conservation Council called for a moratorium on new data centres in Canberra until tougher rules are in place, citing pressure on energy and water. Its director Simon Copland said the proposed second CDC centre in Beard would use double the 5 per cent of ACT peak energy expected for its first stage, while CDC chief executive Greg Boorer said the company already uses closed-loop cooling and the sector must engage communities better. 5