Stop & Shop shoppers trying to order groceries online hit a wall Monday night after a cybersecurity incident at parent company Ahold Delhaize knocked the chain's website and app offline. Stores, including the Stop & Shop at 815 U.S. Route 6 in Somerset, kept their doors open and registers running as the company worked to contain the problem.
Ahold Delhaize confirmed the trouble in a statement posted to its newsroom, saying simply that it was experiencing a security issue within its network. According to Ahold Delhaize, the company's teams took some systems offline deliberately as part of the response, a precaution meant to help protect them while the issue is assessed and mitigated.
The outage hit home for Southcoast and Rhode Island shoppers once Stop & Shop's own site and app stopped working Monday night, as WJAR reported. The grocer said its stores, pharmacies and gas stations were reportedly expected to keep running without disruption Tuesday, even as the digital side of the business stayed dark.
Stores Stay Open While Website Goes Dark
Stop & Shop told customers directly that its physical operations were unaffected by the outage. The company said all stores, pharmacies and fuel stations were open and serving customers during normal operating hours, per the station's report. Anyone with an unfulfilled online order, meanwhile, would get a refund, the chain said.
The disruption wasn't limited to Stop & Shop's corner of the business. Ahold Delhaize USA's five U.S. banner websites, including Hannaford, Stop & Shop, Giant Food, Food Lion and The Giant Company, were all down Monday morning, according to Cybersecurity Dive. The company told the outlet it had no timeline for when its systems would come back online.
Trouble Stretched Across the Atlantic
The reach of the incident extended well beyond Ahold Delhaize's American brands. Websites for the company's Dutch banners, Albert Heijn, Etos and Gall & Gall, were also down Monday morning, the same Cybersecurity Dive report noted. In the Netherlands, Albert Heijn warned shoppers that product availability would vary by store in the days ahead depending on deliveries, with fresh produce flagged as particularly vulnerable to the disruption, according to NL Times.
Exactly what caused the outage remains unclear. Security experts suspected the incident was ransomware, though Ahold Delhaize had not identified it as such, Bank Info Security reported. WPRI, meanwhile, said the extent of the breach remained unknown at the time of its report.
A Grocery Chain With a Recent History of Breaches
This isn't the first time Ahold Delhaize's network has drawn scrutiny. In late 2024, the company experienced a cybersecurity incident that potentially exposed sensitive information belonging to more than 2 million people, according to Grocery Dive. That earlier breach forced some systems offline, caused outages on banner websites and temporarily suspended Hannaford's e-commerce services.
The 2024 incident proved costly for customers. Ahold Delhaize said more than 2.2 million people had information stolen from its systems during that cyberattack, per The Record. Personal, financial and health information belonging to those 2.2 million individuals was stolen in that attack, Bank Info Security reported. It is unclear whether any such data has been compromised in this week's incident.
Grocery chains broadly have felt the financial sting of these attacks. United Natural Foods experienced reduced sales volume and increased operational costs after a cyberattack disrupted its digital distribution system, The Record noted, underscoring how deeply a single network breach can ripple through a supply chain built on constant deliveries. For now, Ahold Delhaize has not provided additional details about the scope of this week's incident, and WJAR said it would share updates as more information becomes available.
