Not cool: who hacked France’s supermarket fridges?
Source: The Guardian ·
Whether it was youngsters proving their skills or state sabotage, Europe’s most hacked country was left with a mountain of waste after food began cooking in freezersShortly before midnight last Sunday, the digital thermostats controlling hundreds of supermarket cold aisles across France began to flicker and rise.In a “bizarre and unprecedented” cyber-attack, hackers had remotely overridden the…
From the source
Shortly before midnight last Sunday, the digital thermostats controlling hundreds of supermarket cold aisles across France began to flicker and rise. In a “bizarre and unprecedented” cyber-attack, hackers had remotely overridden the temperature settings on thousands of freezers, fridges and chiller cabinets pushing them from as low as -27C (-16.6F) to well over 50C (122F). Over the next four to six hours, the food inside first defrosted, then slowly began to cook. Shop staff arriving early to restock shelves reported catching a blast of hot air, like opening an oven, when they went to fill freezers. One Normandy supermarket reported a number of its freezers had been pushed to 80C (176F). In certain stores, the extreme temperature rise had sparked fires triggering sprinklers and water damage. “It was a catastrophe,” said one worker at the large Intermarché supermarket in the south-west suburb of Issy-les-Moulineaux in Paris. “They pushed the freezers here up to 62C. Everything had to…