On the night of Sunday 11 October, attackers got into the refrigeration systems of hundreds of supermarkets across France. Les Mousquetaires, the group that owns Intermarché, told Reuters that around 150 of its stores were hit and that fridges were heated to 50°C for six hours, spoiling all of the frozen and chilled produce.

How did they get in?

Danfoss, the manufacturer of the cooling controllers, had already fixed the vulnerabilities and released the fix in a firmware update. It hasn’t been officially confirmed yet, but it looks as though the affected stores hadn’t applied it.

Your office has the same problem

Most businesses don’t run cold rooms, but nearly all of them have kit that works the same way: printers, CCTV recorders, door entry panels, NAS drives, Wi-Fi access points and firewalls. They get installed, plugged in and forgotten about.

A security fix protects nothing until somebody installs it, and once a fix is published, attackers know exactly what to look for.

How Liit keeps every client updated

Windows and software. Updates are rolled out automatically on a schedule, tested on a small group first, with reboots outside working hours.

Laptops, wherever they are. Microsoft Intune keeps devices patched in the office or at home, and anything that falls behind is flagged to our engineers.

Firmware. Firewalls, switches and access points are updated as part of routine maintenance, and we keep a record of every connected device so nothing gets forgotten.

End of support. We warn clients well before hardware or software stops getting security updates, and help plan the replacement.

Monthly reports. You can see what has been patched rather than taking it on trust.

We hold Cyber Essentials Plus, which requires critical and high-risk updates to be installed within 14 days of release. We work to the same standard for our clients.

Not sure when your firewall, printers or CCTV were last updated? We can check your network and tell you exactly what needs attention. Call us on 01442 933356 or get a quick quote, and you’ll speak to an engineer straight away.