Toyota is making record profits but is now being held back by technical problems again. The fear quickly arises that it could be a cyber attack.
Technical problems at the Japanese car giant Toyota have led to a complete loss of production in Japan. An error in the system for managing the parts order is to blame, which is why the parts required for production can no longer be procured, the Volkswagen rival announced. Toyota cannot yet foresee when the fault will be resolved.
The incident sparked fears that Toyota could be the target of a cyber attack. However, a spokesman said it was unlikely. An investigation is underway. Toyota shares slipped 0.2 percent to close at 2,431.5 yen.
The technical problem initially disrupted operations at 12 of Toyota’s 14 assembly plants in Japan. Later in the day, the group also stopped operations at the Miyata plant in the southwestern prefecture of Fukuoka and at the plant of the small car specialist Daihatsu, which belongs to the Toyota Group, in Kyoto. This affects all 28 vehicle assembly lines in Japan. The factories using the same technical system could no longer process orders for vehicle parts as of morning (local time).
Cyber attack on suppliers halted production in March
Toyota had to close all of its plants in March last year after its domestic supplier Kojima Industries suffered a system failure caused by a cyber attack. Again, all of Toyota’s 28 production lines at 14 factories were affected, affecting the production of about 13,000 vehicles. The company was also forced to temporarily suspend part of its operations in July after a cyberattack on a computer system at the port of Nagoya, a Toyota hub, disrupted port services for two days.
Tensions between Japan and China
For several days, Japanese companies have been the target of a spate of protest calls from China after the government in Tokyo last Thursday began controversially discharging treated cooling water from the Fukushima nuclear ruins into the sea. The problem is so serious that the operations of the affected companies are severely affected. Last year, Japan recorded a record number of more than 12,000 cybercrime cases detected by the police, up 160 from the previous year. The number of ransomware attacks alone increased by 58 percent compared to the previous year.
Toyota posted a record profit in the first quarter of the current fiscal year. Net profit rose 78 percent in the three months from April to June compared to the same quarter last year to around 1.3 trillion yen (around 8.3 billion euros). Toyota benefited from the weak yen. There was also strong demand. When the figures were announced, the VW rival stuck to its forecast for the entire fiscal year. The bottom line is expected to be a profit of 2.58 trillion yen, up 5.2 percent.
Source: Stern
