It has since been confirmed that Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) was the target of such an attack. The assault began on Sunday. It has brought to a standstill the company’s Vauxhall vehicle production and showroom operations at an extremely sensitive period for UK vehicle sales. New registration plates were issued across the country on Monday September 1. This timing made the disruption particularly costly for the automotive manufacturer.
When faced with the cyber-attack, JLR I-O immediately took steps to respond by shutting down its systems to reduce damage. On Monday morning, workers at JLR’s Halewood plant in Merseyside woke up to find their emailed messages that they should not report to work. In other cities, employees were ordered to evacuate. This stop in vehicle production strikes a new blow to JLR, which is owned by India’s Tata Motors. Just last month, the company announced a steep drop in profits as a result of increased costs from US tariffs.
JLR, like so many other impacted manufacturers, is working around-the-clock to resume business as usual. The company stated that it is “working at pace to restart our global applications in a controlled manner.” The event resulted in massive traffic disruptions. In a statement to Engadget, JLR said no evidence has been found that customer data has been compromised.
“JLR has been impacted by a cyber incident. We took immediate action to mitigate its impact by proactively shutting down our systems.” – Jaguar Land Rover
The cyber-attack punches the UK automotive industry while it’s down and reeling from a difficult year. The industry was already fighting supply chain crises and consumer demand that changed by the minute. The production lines in question are of particular importance due to the increasing demands from customers with the introduction of new registration plates.
JLR’s quick commitment to fixing the situation speaks to its desire to shorten the long-term impact of the disruption. At this stage, the company did stress that its top priority lies in returning all aspects of its business to full functionality at the earliest possible date.
“We are now working at pace to restart our global applications in a controlled manner. At this stage there is no evidence any customer data has been stolen but our retail and production activities have been severely disrupted.” – Jaguar Land Rover
FBI investigators are actively probing the source of the cyber attack. For its part, Jaguar Land Rover is committed to recovering from this incident and getting back to business as usual as soon as possible. The automotive manufacturer’s proactive measures highlight the importance of cybersecurity in today’s digital landscape, especially within industries reliant on seamless operations.