A cyber attack on several blood banks attempted to raise temperatures to extremely high levels but was thwarted before it could cause any damage to blood products or samples, French authorities said.
The incident comes after supermarkets in a number of European countries reported that their Refrigerators in the Refrigerators warmed up after being remotely taken over, resulting in tons of spoiled food at a total cost of millions of dollars.
The attacks have renewed wider concerns about the vulnerability of critical infrastructure and growth Risks of internet-connected consumer “smart” technology.
In the latest cyber attack, the French Blood Station, or EFS, said in a statement released Tuesday that “temperature and pressure thresholds were raised to extremely high levels on Monday at three of its cold storage sites for plasma. Monitoring systems detected the problem quickly, allowing staff to act in time so that “no blood products or samples were compromised,” it said.
French weekly Le Canard Enchaîné, which first reported the cyberattack, said the attack attempted to reset temperatures that normally hover at minus 22 Fahrenheit (minus 30 Celsius) to as high as 230 F (110 C).
The cyber attack hit a supplier of refrigeration equipment at three EFS sites. The products that were stored were plasma bags intended for transfusions and plasma for the manufacture of medicines, and were either transferred or secured, the EFS statement said.
“No health consequences were identified, and no blood products were lost,” the blood bank said.
The EFS said blood collection and distribution operations will remain uninterrupted to ensure continued services to patients in hospitals and other healthcare facilities.
The company that supplies the refrigeration equipment, Coolworld, said in a statement that it is “aware” of the cybersecurity incident.
“The vulnerability currently being reported in the media relates to a component of a third-party supplier and was outside Coolworld’s direct control,” the statement said. The company said only a limited number of units were affected and that it was taking “appropriate measures”.
The French National Cybersecurity Agency and the Ministry of Health are investigating the incident. The ministry did not give an indication of who is behind the cyber attack.
This week’s cyberattacks on refrigeration systems mirror an episode in mid-October that targeted refrigerators and freezers in hundreds of supermarkets and independent stores across France, Belgium and the Netherlands.
One of the chains hit in that earlier incident, the Dutch supermarket chain Ahold Delhaize, said on Wednesday that it expected the cyber attack to reduce its sales in the fourth quarter by as much as $281 million (250 million euros) and reduce its operating income for the period by over $112 million (about 100 million euros).
“While most of the disruption was contained within two weeks, work continues to fully restore our normal operations,” said CEO Franz Muller. “As we all recognize, cyber threats are an increasingly harsh reality of doing business today,” he said in a statement released with Delhaize’s quarterly earnings.
The company previously admitted to “malicious actions by others” and proactively took some of its systems offline, including websites and apps for its various brands in Europe as well as the US.