Peter Green Chilled, UK’s major supermarket distributor to Tesco, Aldi and Sainsbury's, was hit by a cyber attack last Wednesday evening, on May 14.
The victim of the cyber-attack is Peter Green Chilled is a small logistics firm based near Shepton Mallet in Somerset, UK specialises in transporting chilled food.
According to an email seen by the BBC on Thursday, the British logistics company stated that it had been the victim of a ransomware attack.
Peter Green Chilled informed their clients of the ransomware attack on Thursday via email.
The firm’s clients told BBC’s Wake up to Money that they were “receiving regular updates” along with “workarounds” on how Peter Green Chilled planned to proceed with deliveries.
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Supermarket Perishables at Risk from Cyber Attack
However, a customer voiced concerns regarding a large quantity of their perishable products could be wasted and become unsellable owing to the disruption.
An industry source alluding to the recent massive cyber attacks on supermarkets including Marks & Spencer and Co-op told the BBC that while these were larger, the attack spotlights the challenges a smaller logistics firms face such as Peter Green Chilled.
Raghu Nandakumara, the head of industry solutions at Illumio in an official statement said that this latest attack on Peter Green Chilled highlights a troubling trend: “the UK retail sector is under siege from increasingly aggressive cybercriminals.”
“But it’s not just retailers who suffer; these attacks directly impact the public. When systems go down, people can’t shop for essentials or access services they rely on. The societal impact of attacks is significant,” added Nandakumar.
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“Retailers Must Prioritise Operational Resilience”
The industry solutions head alluding to cyber attack trends says the industry is seeing a shift from data theft to outright operational disruption, as attackers target critical systems to force faster payouts.
“Ransomware is proving more damaging than isolated data breaches, with many businesses facing major downtime, reputational harm, and financial loss.” However, he iterated that “now more than ever, retailers must prioritise operational resilience and adopt controls that can prevent attackers from reaching their most vital systems."
Among those potentially affected are major UK supermarkets like Tesco, Sainsbury's, and Aldi, who are Peter Green Chilled's clients. Their customers also include Black Farmer founder Wilfred Emmanuel-Jones.
The British firm’s managing director Tom Binks told BBC that the transport activities of the business have continued unaffected throughout this incident.
While Peter Green Chilled’s customer, Black Farmer founder Wilfred Emmanuel-Jones expressed concern because he had "something like ten pallets worth of meat products" with the company.
He stated that these meat products will have to be “thrown in the bin” if they fail to reach the respective retailers in time
Ten pallets is "thousands and thousands of packs of products, sitting there, and the clock is ticking," he told BBC. "There's no information. Everything along the chain has to be stopped, and then there are thousands of pounds worth of product that are just wasting away."
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