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A major supplier for UK retailers has revealed that it has suffered from a ransomware attack, becoming the fourth business in the space to suffer at the hands of cyber criminals.
Cold and fresh product distributor Peter Green Chilled is a supplier for supermarkets and retailers, including Tesco, Aldi, and Sainsbury’s, among others, and also provides IT services such as vehicle tracking and monitoring, temperature control systems and more.
Speaking with BBC Radio 5 Live’s Wake Up to Money radio segment, a spokesperson for Peter Green Chilled revealed that the incident took place on 14 May and has prevented the organisation from accepting orders from its clients.
However, while unable to discuss further, Peter Green Chilled managing director Tom Binks told the BBC that its transport operations were not affected.
“The transport activities of the business have continued unaffected throughout this incident,” Binks said.
Additionally, Wilfred Emmanuel-Jones, founder of Black Farmer, which is a customer of Peter Green Chilled, said that the incident could cause a loss of up to £100,000 and that the business had “something like 10 pallets worth of meat products” with Peter Green Chilled.
“If they’re not delivered in the next couple of days, because they’re fresh products, they have to be thrown away,” he said.
“For a small business, it is pretty devastating. To make matters even worse is that we’ve just also got a delivery that’s come in from Sweden that is stuck at a port because Peter Green is not taking in any other stock from any suppliers, so we have to try to find some way of getting it to the supermarkets.”
Peter Green Chilled has not yet published a statement or disclosed details of the incident beyond the spokesperson’s comments.
The incident closely follows cyber attacks on three UK retailers – Marks & Spencer (M&S), Co-op, and Harrods, all three of which were claimed by the DragonForce ransomware gang.
According to reports by the BBC, all three incidents have been claimed by the DragonForce ransomware gang, a claim that is backed by signs of their malware and more. Additionally, US cyber firm SentinelOne has also attributed the incidents to DragonForce.
“The DragonForce ransomware group has been targeting UK retailers in a series of coordinated attacks causing major service disruptions,” said Sentinel One.
“Prominent retailers such as Harrods, Marks & Spencer, and the Co-op have all reported ongoing incidents affecting payment systems, inventory, payroll and other critical business functions.”
Additionally, the initial investigation by M&S, Microsoft, CrowdStrike, and Fenix24 concluded that threat actor Scattered Spider was behind the M&S incident, a group believed to have ties to DragonForce and was found using its ransomware.
This may suggest that DragonForce is behind the incident, or that Scattered Spider is part of DragonForce’s new “partner” program, which is similar to ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS) affiliate programs where affiliates use the infrastructure, but instead the partner uses their own branding, identity and operations.
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