The United States and France have pointed to Iran as being behind cyberattacks that targeted refrigeration and freezer facilities at European supermarkets, the Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday.

Losses from spoiled food and damaged equipment total tens of millions of dollars.

The hackers remotely accessed refrigerators and freezers at about 700 French supermarkets last month and raised the temperature, the report said. French authorities said this caused major property damage, fires and food losses. French blood banks were also attacked but stopped the incident before damage occurred. The WSJ said supermarket refrigeration systems in at least 6 European countries were hacked and governments are conducting investigations.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot (장노엘 바로) said at a G7 meeting in Paris, "This is the first large-scale cyberattack carried out on French territory with the aim of destruction," and added, "It will not go unpunished." France summoned Iran's ambassador and plans to propose new European Union sanctions on Iranian groups and individuals involved in the attack. An EU official said there are no plans to impose new sanctions immediately.

French authorities identified as responsible an attack group called "Shahid Kaveh" under the electronic and cyber warfare command of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. The Paris prosecutor's office said it will also seek international arrest warrants for the group's leader and 2 deputies. Shahid Kaveh has previously claimed it attacked Israeli industrial control systems firm Unitronics in November 2023 and Israeli refrigeration facilities in March to April this year. U.S. officials also confirmed that the incident showed features of an Iranian-style cyberattack.

Security researchers said the attacks followed the exposure of vulnerabilities in internet-connected computers used by supermarket chains and refrigeration companies to manage their equipment. The hackers appeared to target systems running some older software. The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency warned last week that hackers were exploiting unpatched controllers to keep equipment in a heated and defrosted state.