France summons Iran envoy over supermarket fridge hack

France has summoned the Iranian ambassador in response to cyberattacks against the refrigeration systems of hundreds of supermarkets last month, which Paris has blamed on Tehran.

The wave of cyberattacks affected 700 retail sites in France overnight between October 11th and 12th, according to the foreign ministry. Iran has denied responsibility, describing the French accusation as “baseless”.

The hackers accessed the software that controls fridge temperatures and increased them to as high as 50 degrees overnight. Major supermarkets including Carrefour, Monoprix, Intermarché and U were hit, causing the mass discarding of fresh food.

Ireland was among the countries affected by later hacks of supermarket fridges, along with retailers in the United Kingdom, Belgium, Estonia and Sweden.

The French government blamed cyber unit Shahid Kaveh, part of the forces of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, for being responsible in a statement on Tuesday.

“This campaign was unprecedented in its scale and level of aggressiveness and has been the first offensive cyber campaign carried out purely for the purposes of sabotage on French soil,” the statement read.

The ministry described Shahid Kaveh as a “persistent threat to our critical infrastructure” and said the supermarket fridge hacks were “unjustifiable, inexcusable and contrary to international law”.

“France reserves the right to take any further steps, both publicly and non-publicly, that it deems necessary and proportionate in order to respond to these cyberattacks,” the statement read.

The Paris prosecutor announced an investigation into the cyber unit responsible, and France said it would push for the European Union to impose sanctions against Iranian entities and individuals involved in the attack.

In response to the accusations, Iran’s foreign ministry issued a statement to say it “categorically rejects the French government’s baseless and one-sided accusations against Iran regarding alleged cyber activities in France”.

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It added that it “strongly condemns this hackneyed policy of levelling accusations against the Islamic republic”.

Earlier this year, the EU sanctioned Iranian company Emennet Pasargad for hacking advertising billboards to “spread disinformation during the 2024 Paris Olympic Games”. It also said the company was linked to hacking a Swedish SMS service, accessing a French subscriber database and advertising its contents for sale on the dark web.