Lion has confirmed that all its breweries are back up and running following a cyber attack earlier this month.
The cyber attack and IT system outage was caused by ransomware that targeted Lion’s computer systems. In response, the company immediately shut down key systems as a precaution.
XXXX and Little Creatures breweries were the first back online, but the brewer was subjected to a second cyber attack.
“We are now brewing, kegging, packaging and distributing beer at our nine major breweries across Australia and New Zealand,” Lion said.
“Despite this progress, we do still expect to see some further disruptions as we continue to restore systems. We will continue to work with our team of experts to complete this work as quickly as possible, minimising any further disruptions, including to supply.
“The timing of this attack – just as the hospitality industry is trying to get back on its feet post COVID-19 closures – could not have been more challenging for Lion and our industry partners.
“As we progress our recovery efforts, it is our number one priority to get back to our usual high standards of service levels before this cyber attack, and support our many valued business partners in what we hope will be a better second half of 2020.
“To date, we still do not have evidence of any data being removed. As we indicated last week, it remains a real possibility that data held on our systems may be disclosed in the future. Unfortunately, this is consistent with these types of ransomware attacks.
“Our expert teams are continuing to do all they can to investigate this further and as previously stated, if we do identify any cases of data being taken or misused, Lion will contact the affected individuals directly.
“Once again, we would like to thank our people, customers, suppliers, and stakeholders right across the business for their ongoing patience, understanding and support over the last few weeks as we have done our best to navigate this period.”
Lion urged other companies to remind their staff to be vigilant about cyber safety, particularly in terms of telephone, SMS, email and social media phishing scams requesting personal information or payment of money.
“It’s advisable to avoid opening attachments from unknown senders and ensure that any communications are legitimate before responding,” the brewer said.
