🚨 BREAKING: Hackers are hitting supermarket freezers in 5 countries at the same time.

This is what Covid looked like in week 1. A few countries. Small numbers. Nobody called it a crisis.

1/ Sweden: stores say hackers hit their cooling overnight. One says fridges and freezers were set to 50°C, and the food spoiled. ICA Kvantum stores in Sjöbo and Tomelilla were hit, plus at least 6 Coop stores. Sjöbo stayed closed through the morning, threw out all affected goods and apologized. ICA says it is working to restore normal operations. In Sankt Olof a store manager said "everything is ruined." Sweden's National Cybersecurity Centre is working on several incidents.

2/ Estonia: the CEO of cooling firm Kitman Coldtech says several clients were targeted and a large chain's freezer was raised to +50°C. It was found and addressed in about 10 minutes, no major damage.

3/ Ireland: SuperValu pulled ALL fresh and frozen food from 13 stores. Its owner, Musgrave, confirmed a "cybersecurity incident" on a "specific model" of fridge.

4/ Luxembourg: Ahold Delhaize says an "IT incident" hit fridges and freezers at dozens of its supermarkets across Luxembourg and Belgium.

5/ Belgium: more than 40 Delhaize, at least 15 Carrefour and around 5 Spar stores were hit. Cold storage climbed to 15°C. Aisles were closed off and large amounts of stock were destroyed. A notice at one Proxy Delhaize said its systems had "fallen victim to hacking."

Now zoom out.

A freezer normally sits at -18°C. In Estonia, hackers reportedly got in through older controllers. In France, the controller maker said many devices were obsolete or ran outdated firmware. Raise the temperature overnight and the food rots. "You can't unspoil food," one professor said.

It did not start today. 3 weeks ago hackers raised freezers at more than 350 sites in France to as high as 50°C. There were fires. Intermarché's CEO put the cost at "tens of millions of euros nationwide in a single day." Sources suspect Russian involvement there. No group has claimed it. That same day an analyst said Spain, Portugal, Poland, Germany and Belgium were affected too.

Covid emptied the shelves. Nobody is calling this a crisis yet. But the Financial Times already puts the ruined food at millions of euros.

Officials say the Pentagon is treating late-August freezer failures on US military bases as a suspected hack. At least 6 base stores were hit. Army investigators are working with French law enforcement.

5 countries in one day. 11 countries named since August.

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