🇫🇷🇮🇷 French officials accused Iran's Revolutionary Guards of orchestrating cyber attacks that disabled commercial refrigerators and freezers across France in October, causing significant disruptions and financial losses.
The French Foreign Ministry summoned Iran's ambassador and threatened additional EU sanctions. A joint report by French spy and cyber agencies identified Shahid Kowa, a cyber-attack unit linked to the Revolutionary Guards, as responsible, and named three alleged associates.
The hackers used front groups like "CyberAveng3rs" and "Cyber Isnaad Front". The report linked the hacks to Shahid Khoa through digital infrastructure patterns and Persian traces, with 700 commercial websites targeted and at least 15 fires reported when the hackers turned up the cooling temperature. Saher Naumaan, a senior threat researcher at the cybersecurity firm Proofpoint, said in an email that the cold storage hack was less a measure of Iran's cyber capability than "how exposed these systems are."