The cyberattacks on commercial refrigerators and freezers in Europe continue, as a slew of grocery stores in Belgium, Ireland, Luxembourg, and Sweden report widespread food wastage as a result of miscreants raising the temperatures to highs of 50ºC (122°F).
In Belgium, around 40 Delhaize stores were affected after the attackers reportedly switched fridges and freezers into defrost mode overnight, between Sunday and Monday, resulting in stock issues.
Diego Louwers, a Proxy Delhaize store manager in Overijse, near Brussels, told RTL Info that the consequences of the cyberattacks were “catastrophic,” forcing the store to throw out the entirety of its fresh and frozen products.
“We can’t have anything worse in our line of work,” he said. “We have to throw away all of our merchandise, and it’s both heartbreaking and very complicated operationally.”
A Delhaize spokesperson said it took steps to ensure stores remain stocked, although fresh and frozen products are “temporarily somewhat limited.”
I rather want to trot out The Onion’s recurring hed of “no way to stop this” on mass shootings. We seriously had this happen a month ago, and these stores still decided remote control of cooling systems was a grand idea.
From what I read last time this happened, they allow monitors at a central location to remotely change the temperature as needed. Which feels like a massive security risk that the connection is internet facing, or even exists at all. I understand monitoring temperatures from a central location, but there should never have been remote controls for the freezer temperature. That just creates a giant singular point of failure for all of the fridges.