Danfoss refrigeration attacks spoiled food across 700 stores
Dark Reading reports cyberattacks on Danfoss-linked refrigeration controls disrupted more than 700 French food and retail stores in one night. A Sekoia analyst also told Reuters that Spain, Portugal, Poland, Germany and Belgium were affected. The report links the incident to outdated AK-SM firmware; the attackers’ identity remains unknown.
French sources cited by Dark Reading said attackers extended freezer defrost cycles—the periods when equipment briefly warms to melt ice—so dangerous warming looked like routine maintenance. Some equipment reportedly reached 50°C, spoiling food and causing small fires.
For retailers relying on remotely managed refrigeration, the incident shows how a change to normal operating behavior can make temperature monitoring harder to interpret while losses spread across a store fleet. The reporting does not establish how widely the firmware exposure persists.