On October 12, 2026, Coopérative U president Dominique Schelcher said a cyberattack was affecting refrigeration facilities at several stores in the French chain, beginning the previous night. He said teams were working with refrigeration specialists to restore operations. Schelcher’s statement

What reports say happened to the refrigeration

News reports described refrigeration controls at French supermarkets as being forced into continuous defrosting. La Dépêche reported that Intermarché, E.Leclerc, and Coopérative U stores were affected; Tom’s Hardware identified the controls as made by Danfoss. La Dépêche Tom’s Hardware

Tom’s Hardware reported a defrost setting of 50°C and said the normal cycle runs for two hours a day. The outlet also reported early French losses approaching €300,000, with possible nationwide losses of several million euros. Those amounts were reported as early estimates. Tom’s Hardware

Dutch retail services were disrupted while stores stayed open

A separate cybersecurity incident affected retail services in the Netherlands. On October 12, NOS reported disruption to Albert Heijn, Etos, and Gall & Gall websites, apps, customer service, deliveries, electronic shelf labels, and loyalty systems. NOS also reported disruption at Delhaize in Belgium. NOS

Ahold Delhaize said it was assessing and mitigating a network security issue and had taken some systems offline as a precaution. The company said its stores were open and serving customers on October 12. That distinction matters for shoppers: online ordering and other retail services were disrupted even as physical stores remained open. Ahold Delhaize’s statement

Why supermarkets connect refrigeration systems

Connected services can help retailers monitor refrigeration alarms and temperatures, manage energy use, adjust temperature setpoints, and troubleshoot equipment remotely. Danfoss describes these functions in its food-retail services. Danfoss

Monitoring and control can also be separate functions. TemperatureWise and Beamform describe independent temperature loggers that collect readings without controlling refrigeration equipment. That arrangement allows remote monitoring without giving the monitoring system authority to change equipment settings. TemperatureWise Beamform