Car dealership Arnold Clark has confirmed the company was hit by a cyber attack last month.
The company said that it has managed to protect its customers' data as well as its systems and third-party partners. However, bringing down its network has caused a temporary disruption to its business and customers.
Pendragon's zealous response to LockBit ransomware is a breath of fresh air Continental 'held to ransom', refuses to confirm if LockBit has stolen data Rental car company Sixt confirms cyber attack, leaves scores of UK customers in the dark
“Our external security partners have now been performing an extensive review of our whole IT network and infrastructure, which is a mammoth task, and they are providing guidance to our IT team on the re-enabling of our network and systems in a safe, secure and phased manner,” the company said.
Arnold Clark's Twitter account communicated that the dealership was experiencing technical issues affecting its systems and telephones. It apologised to customers and notified them it was trying to fix the problems, asking them to direct message its account on Twitter or email them for any queries instead.
Showrooms and branches are currently open and the company can serve customers through a temporary system until its full systems have been restored. Customer vehicle collections are expected to be resumed later this week.
The company revealed this week that it was originally notified by its external cyber security consultants of suspicious traffic on its network on 23 December.
RELATED RESOURCE
Getting board-level buy-in for security strategy
Why cyber security needs to be a board-level issue
Arnold Clark took steps internally to confirm the report with its cyber team and then decided to take down its network voluntarily. It called this a “purely protective measure”, which led it to cut its connectivity to the internet, its dealerships, and third-party connections.
“Based on the information available, it looks like Arnold Clark was able to detect the attack through its security service provider and disrupt it before it put any data at risk,” said Mark Lamb, CEO at HighGround to IT Pro. “This was a very positive step and it shows that Arnold Clark already had a strong security posture in place that proactively monitored for threats, so they could be identified and remediated before they caused harm.
“While it doesn’t look like Arnold Clark’s IT is fully back up and running, the company does appear to have protected its data and customers, which is undoubtedly the most important issue.”
UK-based car dealership Pendragon was also hit by a cyber attack in October 2022 by the LockBit ransomware group. The company confirmed it had been hit by an IT security incident but that its ability to operate wasn’t affected. Pendragon also stated that it would refuse to pay the $60 million (£53 million) ransom that the attackers demanded and instead restore from backups.
-
M&S suspends online sales as 'cyber incident' continuesNews Marks & Spencer (M&S) has informed customers that all online and app sales have been suspended as the high street retailer battles a ‘cyber incident’.
-
Manners cost nothing, unless you’re using ChatGPTOpinion Polite users are costing OpenAI millions of dollars each year – but Ps and Qs are a small dent in what ChatGPT could cost the planet
-
Capita handed £50m London police contract weeks after losing pension dataNews The outsourcer will provide digital fraud reporting services after its cyber incident disclosure drew criticism
-
Supercharge trust for operationsWhitepaper Innovating through uncertainty
-
Western Digital suffers cyber attack, shuts down systemsNews Customers are taking to Twitter to report they’re unable to log into their storage products through Western Digital’s online portal
-
Lazarus blamed for 3CX attack as byte-to-byte code match discoveredNews Additional analysis suggested 3CX developer teams ignored "red flags"
-
Some GitHub users must take action after RSA SSH host key exposedNews One cloud security expert likened the incident to the infamous HeartBleed bug from 2014
-
Latitude hack now under state investigation as customers struggle to protect their accountsNews The cyber attack has affected around 330,000 customers, although the company has said this is likely to increase
-
Four-year-old iframe flaw allows hackers to steal Bitwarden passwordsNews The password manager has known about the issue since 2018, publicising it in a report in 2018
-
WH Smith hit by cyber attack, current and former staff data accessedNews The company stated that it is notifying staff members who have been affected
