Chocolate factory’s cyber meltdown

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CADBURY’S Hobart factory is the first Tasmanian business to be impacted by a global ransomware attack, a local cybersecurity expert says, but it is unlikely to be the last.

Operations at the Claremont factory ground to a halt on Tuesday night as Cadbury’s parent company — Spanish food giant Mondelez — was engulfed in the latest cyber attack sweeping the world.

According to Australian Manufacturing Workers’ Union’s Tasmanian secretary John Short, production stopped about 9.30pm after computers and automated machines went down. Even the phones were not working.

Mr Short said the factory’s 500 employees turned up for work yesterday to find operations halted.

News soon circulated that Mondelez was among a host of global companies caught up in a ransomware attack that unfurled overnight in Europe.

Workers were put on to cleaning duties as they waited to hear more about the cyber attack and Mr Short said regular pest control operations were moved forward to keep the night shift busy.

Yesterday it was unclear how long it would take to restore the computer systems.

“There is no word yet on when things might get going again. It appears the company itself does not yet know,” Mr Short said.

In a statement, Mondelez International said it continued “to work quickly to address the current global IT outage and to contain any further exposure to our network. We do not know when our systems will be restored but we appreciate everyone’s patience … during this process.”

Premier Will Hodgman urged all Tasmanian businesses to take the time to install computer updates to prevent infection from the global ransomware virus.

Will Keston from TasICT says there is a Microsoft patch available which can mitigate the virus and its number is WS17-010.

Experts have likened Petya to the notorious WannaCry virus that hit more than 300,000 computers in May and demanded users pay a ransom.

University of Tasmania cybersecurity lecturer Joel Scanlan said he understood Cadbury was the first company which operated locally to be caught up in a ransomware incident.

“It will certainly not be the last,” Dr Scanlan said.

“This latest kind of attack has been shown to be a good way to make money so they will keep coming.”

He said companies which had industrial-controlled devices running on a specialised code were most likely to fall prey.

“This kind of attack affects things that move slowly. In a big business context if things are not automated they are updated all the time,” he said.

This latest kind of attack has been shown to be a good way to make money so they will keep coming

Cybersecurity lecturer JOEL SCANLAN