European Retailers Hit by Cyber Incidents, With Systems Taken Offline

Several retail firms across Europe have confirmed cyber incidents that are causing operational disruptions. On October 12, Dutch multinational Ahold Delhaize said it was dealing with "a security issue" and had taken "some systems offline" to protect them. The disruption was reported to affect three of its brands: Albert Heijn (operating in the Netherlands and Belgium), the drugstore chain Etos and the liquor store chain Gall & Gall.

The next day, Reuters reported that South African retail group The Foschini Group (TFG) was investigating a "cyber incident" first noticed on October 11. It affected certain IT systems at its UK subsidiary, TFG London, including the Phase Eight, Hobbs and Whistles brands. TFG said there was "no reason to believe that payment information is at risk" at this stage and that it had reported the incident to UK authorities. Its TFG Africa and TFG Australia subsidiaries are not experiencing disruption. A Huntress adviser noted that this suggests some system separation was in place, which limited the impact. Separately, The Times reported that H&M is examining information circulating online about a potential incident, though the retailer said it had found no indication its data environment was compromised.

There is currently no indication that these incidents are related to each other. They follow reports that customers of UK retailer ASOS received a strange push notification suggesting the company had been hacked.