Schneider Electric confirmed it is investigating a breach as ransomware group Hellcat claims to have stolen more than 40GB of compressed data – and demanded the French multinational energy management company pay $125,000 in baguettes or face leaking sensitive customer and operational information.

And yes, you read that correctly: payment in baguettes. As in bread.

Schneider Electric declined to respond The registry‘ specific questions about the break-in, including whether the attackers really want $125,000 worth of baguettes or whether they’ll settle for cryptocurrency.

However, a spokesperson emailed us the following statement:

A ransomware crew called Hellcat claimed to have accessed Schneider Electric’s infrastructure through the energy management giant’s $40 billion Atlassian Jira system.

“This breach compromised critical data including projects, issues, and plugins, along with more than 400,000 rows of user data, totaling more than 40 GB of compressed data,” the criminals posted on their leak site.

The miscreants also promised to delete the data as long as the French company hands over the dough.

“Failure to comply with this demand will result in the dissemination of the compromised information,” they threatened. “If you report this breach, the ransom will be reduced by 50 percent, it’s (sic) your choice Olivier…”

“Olivier,” we assume, is Olivier Blum, who was announced Monday as Schneider’s new CEO. This is the same day that Hellcat put the multinational on its site of shame, which does not make for a pleasant first week of work.

Also on Monday, Hellcat leaked data that the group claimed belonged to the Jordanian Ministry of Education and the Tanzanian College of Business Education.

This is Schneider Electric’s third breach in less than two years. In February, Cactus ransomware infected the company’s Sustainability Business division. And in June 2023, the French giant was among the thousands of organizations and millions of individuals whose data was stolen by the CL0P ransomware crew during the MOVEit attacks. ®