Cyberattack hits French blood bank site but no blood products were compromised
Staff detected the temperature spike in time, and no blood products were lost, officials said, as investigators probe the supplier breach.
- On Monday, the French Blood Establishment reported a cyberattack where hackers remotely reprogrammed refrigeration units to reach 110°C; an on-duty technician detected the temperature spike overnight and averted damage.
- France's national cybersecurity agency, CERT-FR, issued a security alert on October 12, 2026, reporting compromises involving Danfoss AK-SM and AK-SC controllers and warning against exposing management interfaces to the internet.
- Hackers breached systems maintained by Coolworld, a contractor servicing EFS storage containers normally kept at −30°C, with the attack also affecting Copeland and Dixell XWEB refrigeration management equipment.
- France's Health Ministry confirmed the breach caused zero operational disruption to blood transfusions, yet the incident has raised broader concerns about security of systems connected to critical healthcare infrastructure.
- Affected facilities in the Bourgogne-Franche-Comté region have drawn attention to earlier CERT-FR warnings about exposing refrigeration management interfaces, prompting renewed focus on securing critical healthcare infrastructure.
246 Articles
246 Articles
The cyberattack was thwarted before it could cause any damage to blood products or samples.
In Germany and France new cases of cooling systems manipulated by hackers have become known. In Bavaria it hit a butcher's shop. In France a particularly sensitive area: the blood donation service.
France's national blood transfusion service has announced that hackers have accessed control systems and raised temperatures in three cold stores where vital blood products were stored. The incident seems to mark an escalation of blood...
Il Sole 24 Ore
La RepubblicaRefrigerator cells containing stocks of blood from donors have suffered a hybrid attack that targeted a refrigerator manager of the French Blood Institute. All this, they have...
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