Photo/Illutration Toyota Motor Kyushu Inc.’s Miyata Plant in Miyawaka, Fukuoka Prefecture (Asahi Shimbun file photo)

Toyota Motor Corp. said it will resume full-scale operations at its 14 plants across Japan on March 2 after a suspected cyberattack against a key supplier that forced the company to halt production.

Toyota suspended operations at all the factories on March 1 due to fears of a major disruption to its supply chain following a system failure at Kojima Industries Corp., a supplier of plastic parts.

The automaker apparently decided it would be able to resume domestic production after the supplier restored its system through alternative means.

“It seems probable that we were targeted by a cyberattack,” said a Kojima Industries representative.

Kojima Industries learned late Feb. 26 that its server was infected with a computer virus, which was followed up by a threat from hackers.

The company called in outside experts the following day to shut down its network connected to Toyota and other firms to prevent further attacks.

Kojima Industries was likely hit by a ransomware virus, but it has not provided specifics on the amount of money demanded by the hackers.

The official said the company is still investigating the source of the attack and the extent of damage.

The incident prompted Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno to urge businesses to strengthen their cybersecurity.

“The risk of cyberattacks is growing amid recent developments in Ukraine and other trends that are causing concern,” Matsuno said at a March 1 news conference. “There are mounting fears over possible distributed denial of service (DDoS) and ransomware attacks on companies.”

(This article was written by Jumpei Miura and Kohei Kondo.)

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