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A hack at Jaguar Land Rover has taken such a heavy toll that the UK government is giving the automaker a £1.5 billion loan ($2 billion).
On Sunday, the UK announced the loan to “give certainty” to the automaker’s supply chain after the cyberattack shut down manufacturing at Jaguar Land Rover for about a month.
“This cyberattack was not only an assault on an iconic British brand, but on our world-leading automotive sector and the men and women whose livelihoods depend on it,” UK Business Secretary Peter Kyle said. The car company employs 34,000 people in the UK, and relies on suppliers that employ another 120,000, the government added.
The automaker first disclosed the hack on Sept. 2, when it stopped production. The resulting disruption has been so severe that the automaker has been forced to repeatedly delay restarting manufacturing until Oct. 1, while implementing a “phased restart of operations.”
A group called Scattered Lapsus$ Hunters, a reference to three notorious cybercriminal gangs, has claimed responsibility for the attack in previous posts on the messaging app Telegram. Security researchers suspect the group gained access to Jaguar’s systems through an earlier breach in March via the HellCat ransomware gang, which leaked the stolen information, including source code and employee databases, containing user names and email addresses.
Investigators have since arrested at least three members of Scattered Spider, a group known to be made up of native English-language speakers who excel at social engineering tactics, including impersonating customer support to phish company employees.
It’s not entirely clear why Jaguar Land Rover has taken so long to recover from the hack, which has been estimated to cost £50 million ($67 million) a week due to the production stoppage. However, it appears that the company is finally seeing some progress. On Monday, it announced that “some sections of our manufacturing operations will resume in the coming days.”
“We continue to work around the clock alongside cybersecurity specialists, the UK Government’s NCSC and law enforcement to ensure our restart is done in a safe and secure manner,” the automaker added.
Still, the BBC reports that it’s possible the government will float another loan to prevent the automaker’s suppliers from collapsing. Jaguar Land Rover is required to pay back the existing $2 billion loan over five years.