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Police ask Ahold to file report after cyber incident

No criminal investigation is under way yet, but police and prosecutors want to secure technical information.

Follow-up to: Albert Heijn brings systems back online, but supplies remain uncertain Wednesday, 14 October 2026, 18:01

The police and the Public Prosecution Service have invited Ahold Delhaize to file a report about the cybersecurity incident affecting Albert Heijn and other brands belonging to the group. According to the police, no criminal investigation is under way yet.

The invitation is a new step in dealing with the incident. The police and Public Prosecution Service say they are receiving many questions about the disruption and have been in contact with Ahold Delhaize. A report could give investigators access to technical data needed to reconstruct an attack and investigate possible links with other cyber incidents.

Ahold has not yet filed a report, as far as can be established from the public information. The police stress that an invitation is no indication that suspects have already been identified or that a specific attack method has been established. Nor has it been disclosed who might be behind the incident.

The group previously reported that, as a precaution, it had taken parts of its network offline. According to Ahold, the company is working on recovery and a controlled restart of systems. For the time being, the company says it has no indications that data belonging to customers, employees or partners has been stolen.

The police report that Ahold Delhaize notified the incident under the new Cybersecurity Act. Information from such a notification can be used in the broader fight against cybercrime, but a statutory notification is different from a criminal report. The former gives regulators and the NCSC visibility into the incident; the latter can support a criminal investigation.

A number of questions therefore remain unanswered for customers. The cause of the disruption, the identity of the attackers and the precise consequences for the systems have not yet been made public. Ahold says the impact varies by brand. Shops remain open, but digital services and supply processes have not been restored everywhere at the same time.

The police more often call on companies that fall victim to cybercrime to share information quickly. This can help compare the technical characteristics of attacks. At the same time, scope for public details remains limited while Ahold and external security specialists investigate the systems. The invitation from the police and Public Prosecution Service therefore mainly means that the criminal investigation chain wants to secure information, not that a criminal case is already under way.

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