French blood banks hit by cyber chill
Hackers raised cooling temperatures at three EFS sites, but staff moved blood products before damage occurred.
By Alessia Desai ·
A cyber attack forced three French blood banks to act quickly to protect their supplies on November 4.
The French Blood Establishment, or EFS, said the incident targeted one of its service providers rather than the main organization. Attackers changed the settings on refrigeration units, pushing temperatures and defrost cycles to very high levels. Staff noticed the changes because monitoring and alarm systems triggered alerts. They moved blood products and samples to other facilities as a precaution. EFS stated that no blood products were lost and no health consequences were identified. The affected stock included plasma bags for transfusions and plasma used in medicine manufacturing.
The organization reported that only a limited number of sites were involved. EFS declined to share the specific temperatures reached in the equipment. It said it needs more technical details from the service provider to determine the full extent of the incident. The agency has strengthened checks on all its refrigeration equipment. Blood collection and distribution activities continue as normal.
EFS is working with the French National Cybersecurity Agency, ANSSI, and the Ministry of Health. The organization has not identified the origin of the attack or the responsible parties. This incident follows similar cyber disruptions in the meat processing and supermarket sectors in Europe and Britain. Those attacks involved compromised fridges and freezers that warmed up, spoiling food worth millions of dollars.
The event occurred shortly after Britain's National Cyber Security Centre issued a warning on November 3. The NCSC said artificial intelligence is helping attackers operate on an industrial scale. The agency assessed that AI is highly likely to be used in attacks against Britain's critical national infrastructure by 2028. The NCSC, part of GCHQ, also named China as the UK's most sophisticated and sustained cyber challenge. It predicted China would likely use AI to advance its geopolitical objectives within that same timeframe.
Source: Sky News
