Hackers hit supermarket freezers across Europe overnight into 2 November. Staff arrived to find cooling units set as high as 50 to 55 degrees Celsius. Food was spoiled and stores threw out stock. The same pattern appeared three weeks earlier in France. What happened on 2 November - Sweden: ICA and Coop stores were hit. One ICA shop in Sjöbo said freezers reached 50 degrees. Another reported 55 degrees. Managers said everything was ruined. Sweden’s national cybersecurity centre is looking into several incidents. - Belgium and Luxembourg: Ahold Delhaize called it an IT incident affecting dozens of stores. Around 40 Delhaize shops, 15 Carrefour stores, and about five Spar outlets were reported. One Delhaize branch in Hoeilaart said it lost about 100,000 euros of stock. Aisles were closed and goods destroyed. - Ireland: SuperValu (Musgrave) removed all fresh and frozen food from 13 stores after a cybersecurity incident on a specific fridge model. - Estonia: Kitman Coldtech said a client’s freezer was raised to 50 degrees. Staff found it and fixed it in about ten minutes. No major damage was reported. The same method was used as in France. Units were switched into continuous defrost mode so they heated instead of cooled. Belgian refrigeration firm Sabcobel confirmed this for Delhaize systems. Earlier attack and wider picture In mid-October, hackers raised freezers at hundreds of French stores (Intermarché, Coopérative U, Carrefour and others) to as high as 50 degrees. There were food losses and some fires. Intermarché’s side put the cost in the tens of millions of euros. Controllers from Danfoss were involved; many ran outdated or end-of-life firmware. The November incidents also reached the Netherlands and Finland. Kesko in Finland said it was investigating. No group has claimed the attacks. The EU food and agriculture commissioner called the repeated incidents a deliberate attempt to disrupt the food supply chain and undermine consumer confidence. In late August, freezers at at least six US military base commissaries malfunctioned in a similar way. The Pentagon is treating those as a suspected cyberattack and is coordinating with French authorities. A normal freezer sits near -18 degrees. Once the temperature rises for hours, the food cannot be saved. Stores simply throw it away. The pattern shows how older internet-connected refrigeration controllers can be used to damage the cold chain without stealing data or demanding a ransom.