Nissan’s Sunderland car factory hit by ransomware hack attack

Nissan’s Sunderland car factory is recovering after being affected by the same computer hack that crippled almost a quarter of NHS trusts last week.

The attack affected organisations and individuals in as many as 150 countries and blocked access to files on thousands of computers.

In a statement earlier today, Nissan said: “Production started on schedule today across all our European operations. While our teams are addressing some localised issues, it’s business as usual today at Nissan.”

French car manufacturer Renault has also confirmed that production was halted at a number of its factories because of the attack.

In a statement, it said: “Groupe Renault confirms it was impacted by the global cyber attack that began late on Friday May 12. It consists of a ransomware virus.

“Proactive measures were taken immediately in order to stop the spread of the virus and protect the group. A full diagnosis is in progress in order to put in place the appropriate solutions to resume operations.”

The attack took place on Friday evening and spread quickly through computers with the Windows operating system.

It is spread by ‘phishing’, which lures people into opening links that contain malicious code to infect a computer. However, this attack was also able to infect computers on local networks by itself.

Microsoft released an update in March to protect against the attack, but many users had not yet updated their computers.

Known as ‘WannaCry’, the hack encrypts files and demands payment to unlock them. It’s known as ransomware because files are essentially held to ransom.

The European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Cooperation has called the attack “unprecedented”, while the UK’s National Crime Agency urged people not to pay the ransom.

“There’s no guarantee that access to your files will be restored,” it said in a tweet.