Melbourne | Reuters –– Australian and North American units of the world’s largest meat works were hit over the weekend by an organized cyber attack on its information systems, Brazil’s JBS said in a statement.
The attack caused its Australian operations to shut down on Monday. The company said it was working to resolve the incident.
JBS USA, in a statement Monday afternoon, said it had determined Sunday that it “was the target of an organized cybersecurity attack, affecting some of the servers supporting its North American and Australian IT systems.
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JBS added it’s “not aware of any evidence at this time that any customer, supplier or employee data has been compromised or misused as a result of the situation.”
Resolution “will take time, which may delay certain transactions with customers and suppliers.”
The attack shut down operations across several Australian states, JBS Australia CEO Brent Eastwood told industry news website Beefcentral on Sunday, at which time he was not able to say how long the stoppage would last.
The world’s largest meatpacker has operations in Canada and the U.S., the latter of which on Monday marked the Memorial Day public holiday.
Australian meat processing operations would be impossible without normal access to IT and internet systems, according to the Beefcentral report. JBS’s Primo Smallgoods business in Queensland state has also been affected, the report said.
JBS USA said Monday its response included suspending “all affected systems,” but didn’t say whether operations at North American plants were affected to the same extent as in Australia.
JBS USA’s holdings in Canada include the company’s major beef slaughter and packing plant at Brooks, Alta. and case-ready meat plants at Calgary and Belleville, Ont.
— Reporting for Reuters by Melanie Burton. Includes files from Glacier FarmMedia Network staff.
