A US subsidiary of Brazilian meat processor JBS SA has told Washington that it received a ransom demand in a cyberattack that it believes originated in Russia.
JBS received the demand from “a criminal organization likely based in Russia” following the attack that has affected its operations in Australia and North America, White House principal deputy press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said on Tuesday.
Later on Tuesday, JBS said that it had made “significant progress” in dealing with the cyberattack and expected the “vast majority” of its plants to be operating yesterday.
Photo: Bloomberg
“Our systems are coming back online and we are not sparing any resources to fight this threat,” JBS USA chief executive officer Andre Nogueira said in a statement.
The White House and the US Department of Agriculture have been in touch with the company several times this week, Jean-Pierre said.
JBS is the second-largest producer of beef, pork and chicken in the US.
If it were to shut down for even one day, the US would lose almost one-quarter of its beef processing capacity, or the equivalent of 20,000 beef cows, Michigan State University agriculture professor Trey Malone said.
The closures reflect the reality that modern meat processing plants are heavily automated, for the safety of the food and the workers. Computers collect data at multiple stages of the production process, and orders, billing, shipping and other functions are all electronic.
JBS, which has not stated publicly that the attack was ransomware, said the cyberattack affected servers supporting its operations in North America and Australia.
Backup servers were not affected and it said it was not aware of any customer, supplier or employee data being compromised.
Yesterday, JBS plants in Australia resumed limited operations in New South Wales and Victoria states, Australian Minister of Agriculture David Littleproud said.
The firm hoped to resume work in Queensland state today, he said.
JBS is the largest meat and food processing company in Australia, with 47 facilities, including abattoirs, feedlots and meat processing sites.
Littleproud said that his department and Australian law enforcement officials were due to be in contact with their counterparts in the US yesterday.
Malone said that the disruption could further raise meat prices ahead of summer barbecues.
Even before the attack, US meat prices were rising due to COVID-19 shutdowns, bad weather and high plant absenteeism.
The US Department of Agriculture estimates that beef prices are to climb 1 to 2 percent this year, poultry as much as 1.5 percent and pork 2 to 3 percent.
The FBI is investigating the incident and the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency is offering technical support to JBS.
Jean-Pierre said the White House “is engaging directly with the Russian government on this matter and delivering the message that responsible states do not harbor ransomware criminals.”
In addition, the US Department of Agriculture has spoken to several major meat processors in the US to alert them to the situation, and the White House is assessing any potential impact on the nation’s meat supply.
JBS has more than 150,000 employees worldwide.
Jason Crabtree, cofounder of QOMPLX, a Virginia-based artificial intelligence and machine learning company, said that Marriott International Inc, FedEx Corp and others have also been targeted.
He said that companies need to do a better job of rapidly detecting bad actors in their systems.
“A lot of organizations aren’t able to find and fix different vulnerabilities faster than the adversaries that they’re fighting,” he said.
Crabtree said that the government also plays a critical role, and that US President Joe Biden’s recent executive order on cybersecurity — which requires all US federal agencies to use basic security measures, like multifactor authentication — is a good start.
Additional reporting by AP
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