The Greeley JBS meat packing plant in Greeley, Colorado. (Photo by Matthew Stockman/Getty Images)
Less than a week after the Transportation Security Administration responded to the Colonial Pipeline shutdown with a landmark order for oil and gas pipelines to abide by cybersecurity rules, major food supplier JBS had operations interrupted by its own cyberattack. The United States government traditionally handled cybersecurity on a sector-by-sector basis. How does it respond to a problem that transcends industry boundaries?
JBS is the world’s leading provider of meat, operating in six countries, and producing 32 billion pounds per year. It announced Monday that an “organized cyberattack…may delay certain transactions with customers and suppliers.” It is unclear what the motivations for the cyberattack were, financial or otherwise, but the incident leaves many questioning how government and industry alike can better tackle increasingly glaring security gaps throughout criti
A cyberattack forced the world's largest meat supplier, JBS, to shut down pork and beef processing in some factories in the United States, Canada and Australia on Monday and Tuesday. It's unclear which group orchestrated the attack, and there's no word on when operations will resume at the affected facilities in Ottumwa, Iowa; Worthington, Minnesota; Cactus, Texas; Greeley, Colorado; Brooks, Alberta; and across Australia. In a press release, JBS.
White House Responds, US Meat Supply Under Strain After Cyberattack Hits JBS Foods
The White House Tuesday said that the cyberattack affecting meatpacking firm JBS Foods’ systems appeared to originate in Russia and said the administration is offering assistance.
“JBS notified the administration that the ransom demand came from a criminal organization, likely based in Russia,” White House principal deputy press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters, adding that the Biden administration is “engaging directly” with Moscow and has sent a “message that responsible states do not harbor ransomware criminals.”
On Monday, JBS confirmed in a release that it was hit with a cybersecurity attack. The firm’s servers in Australia and North America were impacted during the incident.