COSCO Shipping comes under cyber attack

JULY 25, 2018 — COSCO Shipping Lines has been hit by a cyber attack on its North American operations.

Although the company reportedly identifies the problem as a ransomware attack in internal communications, for public consumption it is referring to it as a “network breakdown within America Regions” and is telling customers this:

Due to local network breakdown within our America regions, local email and network telephone cannot work properly at the moment. For safety precautions, we have shut down the connections with other regions for further investigations.

So far, all the vessels of our company are operating as normal, and our main business operation systems are performing stably. We are glad to inform you that we have taken effective measures. Except for above regions affected by the network problem, the business operation within all other regions will be recovered very soon. The business operations in the affected regions are still being carried out, and we are trying best to make a full and quick recovery. We will keep you updated of the latest progress through various channels.

We apologize for all the inconvenience and thank you for your patience and support.