Ahold Delhaize cyber incident takes US grocery sites and apps offline

Ahold Delhaize, the Dutch-Belgian owner of Food Lion, Stop & Shop, Giant Food, The Giant Company and Hannaford, took some of its systems offline after finding what it called a security issue in its network. The company disclosed it at 8:29 am Amsterdam time on Monday, October 12. The trouble started the afternoon before, according to Dutch media. By Monday the websites and apps of all five US chains were down and online grocery orders had stopped.

Ahold Delhaize runs more than 9,400 stores and employs close to 400,000 people, BleepingComputer reported. Its stores stayed open. For IT teams, the useful part of this incident is which systems kept running once the company pulled the plug on the rest, and what that did to suppliers, staff and customers who depend on the systems that went dark.

What stopped and what kept working

In the US, Grocery Dive found all five banner websites down on Monday morning. Hannaford's To Go pickup and delivery service was offline, according to The Boston Globe. Giant Food sent shoppers to DoorDash, Uber Eats and Instacart, and online orders that could not be filled are being refunded. A Food Lion memo seen by BleepingComputer warned stores they might not be able to pick, stage or hand over online orders. Stop & Shop staff told BleepingComputer they could not reach their work schedules or pay stubs.

Refrigeration and point-of-sale systems were not affected, a spokesperson told the Globe. Pharmacies and fuel stations kept operating.

The European business took a harder hit. In the Netherlands, work stopped at several Albert Heijn distribution centers, NL Times reported. An email to a supplier, obtained by Dutch broadcaster RTL Z, said only the Zaandam center was still running and told suppliers to book a slot and deliver there only. Albert Heijn warned that stock, fresh produce in particular, would vary from store to store over the next few days. Online ordering stopped at Albert Heijn, Etos and Gall & Gall, loyalty discounts were switched off, and electronic shelf labels could show last week's prices, so the price at the register may not match the shelf. Delhaize in Belgium said it could not take new orders this week, Cybernews reported.

What Ahold Delhaize has not said

The company has not said what caused the incident, whether data was taken, whether any devices were encrypted, or when service will return. No ransomware group had claimed the attack as of Monday. Ahold Delhaize USA told Grocery Dive it had no timeline for restoring systems.

The statement was filed as inside information under the EU Market Abuse Regulation, the rule for news that could move the share price. Shares fell 3.15% on Monday to close at 31.38 euros in Amsterdam.

This is the company's second major incident in two years. In November 2024 an attack on its US business took systems offline and caused a multi-day outage of Hannaford's e-commerce service. BleepingComputer ties that attack to the INC Ransom group, and Ahold Delhaize later said it may have exposed personal data of about 2.2 million people.