Household smart fridges and energy meters could be hacked by hostile states looking to cause “chaos”, cyber security experts have said.
Hackers sent temperatures soaring in supermarket freezers across 10 countries – including Ireland, Italy, Belgium, Portugal and Sweden – three weeks after an unprecedented cyber attack caused French freezers to heat to 50°C, spoiling millions of euros worth of food.
Older internet remote-control boxes that manage refrigeration were targeted with an automatic defrost function, triggering dozens of shops, including IKEA.
Security experts believe a state actor like Russia may be to blame for the attacks, which also affected fridges in a small number of British businesses.
While state-linked attackers are more likely to target supply chains or national infrastructure to cause maximum disruption, experts are now calling for homeowners to reconsider if they need appliances that connect to the internet and action from government.
‘It could cause chaos’
A YouGov poll last year showed three per cent of Britons have smart fridges – the equivalent of more than two million people across the UK.
Labour MP Graeme Downie, chair of the Coalition on Secure Technology, said the attacks on supermarket fridges across the continent should make people in the UK consider the connected appliances in their homes.
“Millions of households now have fridges, freezers and other appliances that connect to the internet and receive software updates from their manufacturers,” he told The i Paper.
“One fridge failing is an inconvenience. But if hostile actors remotely interfered with large numbers of connected appliances at the same time, the combined effect could be chaos.”
Downie and others have warned of the use of cellular modules, a component used in smart devices that can connect to the internet or mobile network, from manufacturers that are subject to Chinese national security law.
These companies have to assist Beijing’s security authorities if asked to do so.
Perishable goods were ruined after refrigeration and freezer systems were hacked at supermarkets across Europe this week (Photo: Dursun Aydemir/Anadolu via Getty Images)Downie said Government must improve safeguards on who controls components inside products, and the updates sent to them, following this week’s European cyber attacks.
“We do not yet know who was responsible, but the lesson for the UK is clear: everyday devices can now be remotely tampered by hostile actors,” he said.
“We need clear limits on high-risk technology in our critical infrastructure. We need to act now to protect us from the type of attacks seen across Europe this week, or potentially even worse, food supply havoc.”
Energy meters and smart TVs also ‘vulnerable’
Luke de Pulford, the co-founder of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China, which monitors the threat from Beijing, said any firmware in devices that requires remote software could be vulnerable to hacking from a foreign-based entity.
“Energy smart meters, microwaves, smart TVs – those are all things that are vulnerable. But also Chinese-made CCTV equipment. These are all devices that are well known to be vulnerable,” he said.
“Smart meters, if they are Chinese-made and have a Chinese cellular module in them, can certainly be used to gain really quite worrying degrees of control over energy flows within the United Kingdom, how they’re monitored, how that data is collected, but also the possibility of remote manipulation.”
This is mostly for “mass data gathering” to understand “how we use our energy and how they might be able to gain an advantage”.
Pulford added: “But in a worst-case scenario [is] the possibility of simply shutting off the flow, which smart meters can do.”
The YouGov poll last year showed smart meters are the most common wi-fi controlled household item, used by 39 per of Britons. This equates to 27 million people in the UK.
The next popular was smart voice-controlled speakers (35 per cent), home security cameras (18 per cent), thermostats (14 per cent), and smart light systems (12 per cent).
Household attacks less likely
While smart devices in the home could be hacked, experts said attacks are much less likley.
Professor Alan Woodward said domestic fridges in the UK would not be at risk from the attacks seen in Europe this week – which focused on specific control units used by commercial operators.
And attacking the limited number of smart fridges in UK households would also not cause enough disruption that state actors would consider it, he said.
“Nation states tend to be going after critical infrastructure – so power, gas, utilities, telecoms,” he added.
Jen Ellis, who works on the Government’s Cyber Advisory Board, said there had never been a mass cyber attack on domestic devices like fridges, washing machines or microwaves.
“I think the question I would ask is, where’s the really big bang? What’s the really big impact you’re creating? Because the average household probably doesn’t have that much stuff in their fridge and freezer,” she said.
“Any loss can be very impactful, but not impactful at the scale that we’re talking about to make it really feel like, aha! As a nation state, or even as a cyber criminal, this is going to be a really big payoff for me.”
Tens of thousands of euros worth of food was ruined by the cyber attack that affected at least seven countries (Photo: Johan Nilsson/ TT News Agency / AFP via Getty Images)What can be done to stop fridge hacks
Rupert Ashby, chief executive of the British Frozen Food Federation, said: “One question we all need to ask ourselves is whether everything needs to be connected to a network.
“Connectivity brings potential vulnerabilities, from conventional hackers to increasingly sophisticated AI-driven attacks. In the UK, we have kept a fantastic food supply chain moving for many decades without this equipment being connected to the internet.”
Downie called on government to “look at who controls the components inside these products and the updates sent to them”, adding: “Families must be able to trust the appliances in their homes.”
He added: “We need clear limits on high-risk technology in our critical infrastructure… We need to act now to protect us from the type of attacks seen across Europe this week or potentially even worse food supply havoc.”
In 2023, a report from a US-based consultancy group warned ministers that China could spy on millions of people in Britain through microchips planted in cars, domestic appliances or light bulbs.
Most microchips needed to connect devices like smart meters and electric cars to the internet are made by Chinese firms.
These microchips, known as cellular modules or CIMs, transmit and receive data remotely and are known as part of “the internet of things”. Downie warned in December that key household technology could be disabled by Beijing.
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