France Says Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Carried Out Fridge Hacks
France has openly pointed the finger at Iran for recent cyberattacks that crippled fridges and created havoc in hundreds of supermarkets across the nation.
“The responsibility for this attack lies with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps,” French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot said on Monday in Paris, in a rare direct attribution of the hacks to a foreign power.
Related: US Warns of ‘Ongoing Cyber Threat’ to Industrial Refrigeration Systems
Barrot, who was speaking on the sidelines of an informal G7 ministerial meeting, said he would be seeking retaliatory measures against Iran and has summoned the country’s ambassador about the matter.
“This is the first large-scale cyberattack with an aim of sabotage on the national territory,” Barrot said. “It hurts the nation’s interests and the security of French citizens. We will take sanctions at the European level against all who are responsible” and “we will take any other proportionate and necessary measure to respond to this attack and dissuade those who would like to reproduce it.”
Related: Supermarkets Across Europe Report New Suspected Freezer Hack
Representatives for Iran’s foreign ministry didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
In parallel, Paris prosecutors said in a statement Monday they have asked an investigative judge with wider probing powers to pursue the case they’d already begun last month. They are also seeking arrest warrants against the head of an Iranian cyber unit affiliated with Iran’s IRGC and his two deputies.
Top photo: A Proxy Delhaize store manager disposes of spoiled produce following a refrigeration outage in Maleizen, on Nov. 2. Bloomberg.