The operator of Colonial Pipeline, Saturday, May 15 that it has resumed “normal operations,”. Since being hit with a ransomware cyberattack that forced it to shutdown, they are now delivering fuel to its markets, including a large swath of the East Coast.
Associated Press reports, that the pipeline company begun the process of restarting the pipeline’s operations on Wednesday evening.
“Since that time, we have returned the system to normal operations, delivering millions of gallons per hour to the markets we serve,” Colonial Pipeline said in a tweet Saturday. Those markets include Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, Georgia, South and North Carolina, Virginia, Maryland, Washington D.C., Delaware, Pennsylvania and New Jersey.
“All of these markets are now receiving product from our pipeline,” the company said, noting how its employees across the pipeline “worked safely and tirelessly around the clock to get our lines up and running.”
As previously reported, a ransomware cyberattack that forced a shutdown of the nation’s largest gasoline pipeline. Last Friday, hackers locked up Colonial pipeline’s computer systems and demanded a ransom to release them.
In response, Colonial shutdown to prevent the malware from impacting its industrial control systems, although the hackers didn’t take control of the pipeline’s operations. According to the Georgia-based company, they’ve restarted, and gasoline deliveries are being made in all of its markets, but it will take “several days” to return to normal. They also said some areas may experience “intermittent service interruptions during this start-up period.”
Colonial Pipeline reports they’re making “substantial progress” in restoring full service. According to Associated Press , they have confirmed sources who say the company paid the criminals a ransom of nearly $5 million in cryptocurrency for the software decryption key required to unscramble their data network.
he ransom of 75 Bitcoins was paid Saturday, May 8. According to Tom Robinson, co-founder of the cryptocurrency-tracking firm Elliptic, this was a day after the Colonial’s corporate network was locked up. Prior to Robinson’s blog post, two people briefed on the case had confirmed the payment amount to the Associated Press.
According to the Georgia-based company, they have restarted and gasoline deliveries are being made in all of its markets, but it will take “several days” to return to normal, and some areas may experience “intermittent service interruptions during this start-up period.”
