France has accused Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps of being behind a cyberattack on supermarket refrigeration systems in France last month. It has vowed to pursue sanctions against Iran at the European level.
The cyberattack on 11–12 October affected multiple supermarkets across France, raising temperatures in refrigeration units and forcing hundreds of stores to discard spoiled food. French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot confirmed that Iran’s Revolutionary Guard had carried out the attack while attending a meeting of G7 foreign ministers in Paris on Monday (9 November).
He said the cyberattack was unprecedented in both its scale and the extent of the intrusion. The government had summoned Iran’s ambassador in Paris to lodge a strong protest.
The Paris prosecutor also said in a statement that authorities had opened an investigation into three leaders of Shahid Kaveh, a covert cyber unit under Iran’s Revolutionary Guard.
The French security agency’s cyber monitoring centre said Shahid Kaveh was better known online as CyberAveng3rs, the name it had previously used to claim responsibility for cyberattacks.
Jean-Noel Barrot told reporters, “It marks the first large-scale cyberattack aimed at sabotage on our national territory, and it constitutes a major attack on the nation’s interests and the security of the French people.” He also said France would pursue sanctions at the European level against all those responsible.
France also accused Iran of spreading disinformation about a series of protests in France over the past month.
Beyond France, similar incidents have occurred in other European countries. On 2 November, supermarket freezer systems in at least nine European countries were hit by cyberattacks. The incidents have shocked Europe.
Air traffic in Europe has also been disrupted in recent days, with dozens of flights receiving hoax bomb threats. The source of these threats remains unclear.
European countries have also been on guard against Russian cyberattacks because of their support for Ukraine in its fight against Russia.
