Varta AG, a German battery manufacturer, disclosed on February 13, 2024 that a cyberattack the previous night had forced it to shut down parts of its IT infrastructure and stop production. The company said it had proactively taken systems offline and disconnected them from the internet as a precaution.
Five production plants were affected, three in Germany, one in Romania and one in Indonesia, along with the company's administrative operations. Varta said it had immediately convened a task force supported by external cybersecurity specialists and forensic investigators to assess the damage and restore normal operations.
The company gave no timeline for resuming manufacturing and said the extent of the damage could not be determined at that stage. Production at the affected sites was still halted two days after the disclosure.
No group claimed responsibility in the days that followed, and Varta did not say what kind of attack it had suffered. Help Net Security wrote that the nature of the incident was unknown but that a ransomware attack seemed more likely.
Varta's share price fell by about 4.75 percent after the announcement. The company supplies batteries to automotive and consumer electronics customers across Europe.