JBS Paid $11 Million to Resolve Ransomware Attack -- 2nd Update
10 Juni 2021 - 1:48AM
Dow Jones News
By Jacob Bunge
JBS USA Holdings Inc. paid an $11 million ransom to
cybercriminals who last week temporarily knocked out plants that
process roughly one-fifth of the nation's meat supply, the
company's chief executive said.
The ransom payment, in bitcoin, was made to shield JBS meat
plants from further disruption and to limit the potential impact on
restaurants, grocery stores and farmers that rely on JBS, said
Andre Nogueira, chief executive of Brazilian meat company JBS SA's
U.S. division.
"It was very painful to pay the criminals, but we did the right
thing for our customers," Mr. Nogueira said Wednesday in an
interview with The Wall Street Journal. He added that the payment
was made after the majority of JBS plants were up and running
again.
JBS is the world's largest meat company by sales, processing
beef, poultry, and pork from Australia to South America and Europe.
In the U.S., the company is the biggest beef processor and a top
supplier of chicken and pork. Its subsidiary Pilgrim's Pride Corp.,
also hit by the attack, is the second-largest U.S. poultry
processor.
The attack on JBS was part of a wave of incursions using
ransomware, in which companies are hit with demands for
multimillion-dollar payments to regain control of their operating
systems. The operator of a pipeline bringing gasoline to parts of
the East Coast in May paid about $4.4 million to regain control of
its operations and restore service. The attacks show how hackers
have shifted from targeting data-rich companies such as retailers,
banks and insurers to essential service providers such as
hospitals, transport operators and food companies.
Write to Jacob Bunge at jacob.bunge@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
June 09, 2021 19:42 ET (23:42 GMT)
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