Cyberattack in the 3PL Industry

| By: DGDtransport

Cyberattack on Port of San Diego

Cybersecurity has become much more than a concerns in 2018; with media (fueled by popular shows like Mr. Robot) pushing heavy instances, nothing more touches than a real-life scenario. Last week, the Port of San Diego was subjected to a cyberattack, forcing many within the industry to come face to face with what many others have been victim to- hacking. As reported by the American Shipper on Sept. 27th- “The port’s investigation so far has determined that ransomware was involved in this attack,” Randa Coniglio, the port’s chief executive officer, said. “The port has mobilized a team of industry experts and local, regional, state and federal partners to minimize impacts and restore system functionality, with priority placed on public safety-related systems. The team is currently determining the extent and timing of the incident and the amount of damage to information technology resources and developing a plan for recovery,” Coniglio said.

“Every cyberattack is related to geopolitical conditions”, says Kevin Mandia, CEO of FireEye. The CEO’s company has recently been hired by Google to help tackle a number of safety concerns. Elizabeth Gurdus, at CNBC, reports on Sept. 27th- “In his more than 20 years responding to cyberbreaches, Kevin Mandia, the CEO of enterprise-facing cybersecurity company FireEye, has learned one key, overarching thing about cyberattacks. If you’re in the United States and you hack a company, you’re going to get caught, so you have to live in a safe harbor,” Mandia said. “You almost have to be condoned, you have to be supported, and many of the attacks we respond to, there are, in fact, people in uniform conducting the attacks against our companies.”

cyberattack by hacker dgd transport

Cyberattacks, when mentioned, are often thought and/or tied into political specifically in regards to current President Donald Trump and his relationship with Russian leader, Putin. Bots, fake social media accounts, cyber snooping and countless other accusations have been mentioned between the two in regards to cyberattacks and/or hacking. For the 3PL industry, these terms are heard of, but most lack direct experience. Technical staff members were quick on their feet by “proactively shut down some systems” to proactively help and further hacking. In San Diego’s case, cyber-attackers gained access to a few secure databases and then proceeded to block out the team by changing current and adding new passwords. This specific methodology, otherwise known as ransomware, is a very common hacking approach since most cyber-attackers are simply interested money.

As reported by Katie Pyzyk at SmartCitiesDrive– “Cities and municipally-tied entities realize the increasing threat from ransomware and other various cyberattacks, and they’re taking better preventative measures as well as increased training for potential attacks. This summer, Houston carried out a large-scale, three-day cyberattack training exercise, and the Manhattan, NY district attorney encouraged cities to work together to achieve greater cyber protections. Collaborative prevention is a critical buffer because hackers often try to cause the most widespread damage as possible to get what they want, such as targeting a major supply chain hub — the Port of San Diego — that could have ripple effects throughout a variety of industries. Port attacks can bring the movement of goods to a halt in the targeted country, but they could also slow or stop operations in any country that ships goods to or from the affected port. Ransomware attacks can cause greater panic than other types of cyberattacks such as data breaches because of the level of crippling disruption they cause.”

As further mentioned by Gurdus- “We responded to over 600 breaches last year,” Mandia said. “I would say over 80 percent of them were state-sponsored or state-condoned, meaning the heads of the state or the heads of certain agencies of that state knew the attacks were ongoing, but there’s no risk or repercussions to the attackers.” Mandia’s statements come at a time when cyberattacks on both Wall Street and Main Street, with tech giants warning consumers about the billions of cyberattacks that happen every day and others fretting about how cyber-warfare could affect the 2018 midterm elections. One of Mandia’s top concerns was the lack of “segregation” between government, enterprise and individuals’ networks, he said, cautioning that as the lines are blurred, hackers will likely go after more vulnerable targets and cause malware to “ripple” out through various systems.”

Time will determine the extent of the damage and, more importantly, who the next victim will be. More information about the incident can be found here, after The Port of San Diego was able to move forward on some movement. Once of the ways the team was able to counter the cyberattack was through transparent technology- using real-time tracking on various assets to easily see where they are and compared that information with the what the cyberattacker was manipulating. DGD Transport, powered by TruckHub, follows the same transportation and warehousing methodology. Transparency naturally acts as a line of cyber-defense since it forces those involved to be clear and upfront with their operations. For secure and safe 3PL services contact DGD Transport here and stay tune for further news on the situation.