Co-op systems making progress towards ‘complete recovery’ following cyber attack

The convenience grocer has said systems are “now stable”, and the company’s group chief executive Shirine Khoury-Haq thanked colleagues, suppliers, and members for their support.

In a statement, she said: “Teams across our Co-op have worked day and night to recover, and our technology and information security colleagues are true superheroes.

“What they have done for us, our partners, our peers, our members and our customers in the face of a sustained and highly sophisticated attack was nothing short of heroic.

“You always learn lessons in difficult times and we are coming out of this stronger and more effective than before.

“Most of our recovery work from now on will be behind the scenes, so a big heartfelt thank you in advance to our support teams and our partners for your continued effort and focus.”

She added that there was “still work to do to unwind the operational and technical impacts of the actions we had to take to block the criminals”, as hackers accessed customer non-financial data.

Deliveries to stores were soon paused and there was limited product availability, but Khoury-Haq said Co-op food stores are now well-stocked and its other businesses are back online.

The news arrives as The North Face and Cartier revealed it both saw breaches in similar attacks this week, while M&S has warned disruption from a cyber attack it experienced on Easter Monday could feed into July.