BlueScope latest Australian company hit by hackers

BlueScope Steel has joined Toll Group as the latest victims of a serious cyber attack.

BlueScope Steel’s Port Kembla plant in NSW Picture: AAP

BlueScope Steel has joined Toll Group as the latest victims of a serious cyber attack, saying on Friday its Australian manufacturing plants had been hacked.

BlueScope did not give details of the incident, but it is understood the breach has affected steel production on some lines at its Port Kembla facilities, and back-end functions at its corporate offices.

BlueScope chief financial ­officer Tania Archibald said on Friday the incident was first detected at one of the company’s US businesses and the company had reverted to “manual operations” where possible.

“Our North Star, Asian and New Zealand businesses are continuing largely unaffected with minor disruptions,” the company said. “In Australia, manufacturing and sales operations have been impacted; some processes have been paused, whilst other processes including steel despatches continue with some manual processes and workaround.”

Ms Archibald said: “We are taking this event extremely seriously. Our people are working diligently to protect and restore our systems, and we are working with external providers to assist us. Our focus remains on being able to service our customers and to maintain safe and reliable ­operations.”

The BlueScope attack is the second major online assault on a major Australian company in the past two weeks, after logistics major Toll Group confirmed last week that it had again been the victim of ransomware.

Toll, owned by Japan Post. was forced to shut down some of its online systems after detecting “unusual activity” on some of its servers.

Toll suffered a January ransomware attack that took some of its systems out of action until early March.

Government agency Service NSW was also attacked online last month, with staff email accounts compromised.

The federal government’s Australian Cyber Security Centre warned businesses last week that “advanced persistent threat actors” — often associated with nation states — and cyber criminals were using the coronavirus crisis to target Australian businesses and research facilities.

BlueScope shares closed up 27c to $10.07 on Friday.