Food giant Dole hit by ransomware

Attack earlier this month forced the temporary closure of production plants in North America

Dole, the Ireland-headquartered multinational food corporation and one of the world's largest producers and distributors of fresh fruit and vegetables, was affected by a ransomware attack earlier this month.

In a brief statement on its website, the company says it "...recently experienced a cybersecurity incident that has been identified as ransomware. Upon learning of this incident, Dole moved quickly to contain the threat and engaged leading third-party cybersecurity experts, who have been working in partnership with Dole's internal teams to remediate the issue and secure systems."

It continues: "The company has notified law enforcement about the incident and are cooperating with their investigation."

The statement describes the effects of the attack as "limited," but a memo seen by CNN suggests the company was forced to temporarily close production plants in North America and to stop food shipments to some shops.

The attack appears to have happened on or before 10th February. It disrupted the delivery of some fresh fruit and vegetables, causing customers in the US to complain on social media about the lack of bags of salad on the shelves.

The company has not made public the identity of the attackers, the strain of ransomware deployed or any ransom demands.

This is not the first ransomware attack on the food sector, which is vulnerable to disruption because of its perishable product and just-in-time supply chains.

In May 2021, the REvil group attacked meatpacking firm JBS, forcing it to close temporarily some of its operations in North America and Australia. The Brazil-headquartered food giant later admitted paying $11 million to the attackers to prevent any stolen data from being leaked and to mitigate other issues connected to the attack.

The REVil ransomware gang, thought to be mainly based in Russia, later shut down following an internal dispute and the arrest of several members by Russia's FSB, although in 2022 it resumed operations. An alleged member of the gang, 22-year-old Ukrainian Yaroslav Vasinskyi, was arrested and extradited from Poland to the US in October 2021, where he was charged with computer hacking and fraud as part of his involvement in the Kaseya attack.

The FBI recently warned food companies to be on high alert for business email compromise (BEC) scams. The agency describes BEC as one of the most financially devastating online crimes, costing businesses nearly $2.4 billion in 2021.