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Fendt tractors at the Agritechnica fair 2019
Photo: Hauke Christian Dittrich / dpa
After a hacker attack, the production lines at the headquarters of the tractor manufacturer Fendt in the Allgäu come to a standstill.
According to information from the dpa news agency, work at the plant in Marktoberdorf (Ostallgäu district) has been suspended as a result of a cyber attack.
A company spokeswoman referred to Fendt's US parent company AGCO for information.
AGCO announced on Friday that it had been the victim of a ransomware attack.
The attack took place on May 5 and affected “some of its production facilities”.
In attacks using ransomware of this type, the attackers encrypt their victims' data carriers and demand a ransom in return for the decryption code.
Empty parking spaces
The May 6 press release said they were still investigating the extent of the damage.
However, "it can be assumed that business operations will be affected for several days and possibly longer before all services can be fully resumed, depending on how quickly the company is able to repair its systems." How long the outages would depend on how quickly it was possible to »successfully reinstall software and restore IT operations at the affected locations.«
According to the company, Fendt employs around 4,300 people at its plant in Marktoberdorf.
Other plants are in Wolfenbüttel in Lower Saxony, Hohenmölsen (Saxony-Anhalt), Feucht, Asbach-Bäumenheim and Waldstetten (all in Bavaria).
Several media had reported on the production stop in Marktoberdorf.
The "Allgäuer Zeitung", for example, shows pictures of empty parking spaces on the company premises in Marktoberdorf.
The majority of the employees can therefore not work, and the administration is also partially paralyzed.
According to employees, "various crisis management teams" would meet.
Together with the Kempten criminal police, the central office for cybercrime Bavaria at the general public prosecutor's office in Bamberg is investigating the case, reports the "Bayerischer Rundfunk".
The Fendt brand has belonged to the US group AGCO, one of the largest manufacturers of agricultural machinery in the world, since 1997.
For the first quarter of 2022, the company reported net revenues of approximately $2.7 billion.
mak/dpa
