European authorities are investigating a series of cyberattacks targeting commercial refrigeration systems across the continent, with multiple governments pointing toward Iranian involvement.
Belgian security services have identified indicators suggesting that hacker groups linked to Iran were behind the attacks on local cooling systems, according to NOS Nieuws. Belgian Minister of the Interior and Security Annelies Verlinden said there is no cause for panic, but confirmed the government is using military intelligence and defense resources to map the threat.
However, the Belgian government has stopped short of an official accusation. Kort na Quintins uitspraken haastte minister Prévot van Buitenlandse Zaken zich om te zeggen dat België Iran niet in staat van beschuldiging stelt.
French investigation targets Shahid Kaveh group
France has taken a more aggressive stance, with the Paris prosecutor’s office launching an investigation into the hackers behind the sabotage. The probe targets the leadership of a group identified as Shahid Kaveh, which French officials allege has ties to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, according to Forbes Belgique.
French Minister of Foreign Affairs Jean-Noël Barrot described the incident as the first large-scale cyberattack with sabotage as its primary objective on French soil. The French public prosecutor’s office cited a “characteristic modus operandi,” including the use of Persian-language communications and IP addresses linked to Iran, as the basis for their assessment, NOS Nieuws reported.
The Paris prosecutor, Laure Beccuau, said that Shahid Kaveh is “a cyberoffensive unit connected to the Electronic and Cyber Center of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.”
The attacks in France affected approximately 700 supermarkets, including major chains like Intermarché and E.Leclerc.
In some instances, software vulnerabilities allowed attackers to force temperatures in refrigerators and freezers to climb as high as 50 degrees Celsius, resulting in millions of euros in spoiled inventory, according to Forbes Belgique. Thierry Cotillard, chairman of Les Mousquetaires, the group behind Intermarché, told Reuters that the total costs in France alone could run into the tens of millions of euros.
Widespread impact across European retail
Beyond France and Belgium, retailers in Luxembourg, Sweden, Ireland, and the Netherlands have reported similar interference with their cooling equipment. While large supermarket chains in the Netherlands were largely unaffected, smaller businesses such as local butcher shops and neighborhood stores sustained direct losses, NOS Nieuws noted. According to AD, the hack caused thousands of kilograms of food to be discarded in Belgium, as temperatures in freezers and refrigerators rose sharply.
The motivations behind these coordinated attacks remain a subject of investigation.
French President Emmanuel Macron has characterized the French response as defensive, according to NRC. Peyman Jafari, an Iran expert at the College of William & Mary in Virginia, believes it is plausible that Iran is behind the attacks.
“We don’t know for sure, but I think it’s quite likely,” he said in a phone interview. Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi wrote on X: “The French government is incapable of managing refrigerators, let alone addressing the grievances of its population.”
Unable to manage fridges let alone addressing grievances of its people, French government is shifting blame for its failures onto others. Yes, Iran is powerful. But unlike France, we do not exercise power via support for massacres in Gaza or bombings of schools and hospitals. https://t.co/CDGikenZk2
Open questions regarding the sabotage
Despite the identification of technical indicators, several key aspects of the situation remain unresolved. Authorities have not yet confirmed the total financial impact of the lost food inventory across the affected European countries, nor is it clear if the same groups are responsible for every incident reported in smaller retail sectors.
While France has identified eleven European countries as affected, other countries’ intelligence services have not yet named a culprit. International arrest warrants are also being prepared against three individuals from the Iranian hacker group Shahid Kaveh, according to AD.