Seattle coffee giant Starbucks announced Monday it was hit by a ransomware attack, causing significant disruptions in its operations, particularly affecting the ability to pay baristas and manage schedules.
According to a spokesperson for Starbucks, a third-party vendor experienced an outage starting late last week.
The outage disrupted the systems employees use to view and manage their schedules and the tools Starbucks uses to track working hours.
“The most important thing here is that we’re working very quickly to ensure our partners are fully paid for their hours worked with limited disruption or discrepancy,” the spokesperson said. “As you can imagine, we’re one of many companies experiencing a disruption in service due to Blue Yonder’s ransomware attack.”
Starbucks said store leaders and partners have been guided on how best to work around the outage manually, adding the issue was not impacting customer service.
Ransomware attacks have become an increasingly common tactic used by cybercriminals to target companies.
These attacks can cause significant and sometimes long-lasting disruptions, posing serious challenges for retailers and other businesses.
KOMO News spoke with Starbucks customers who said the attack was worrisome but that it won’t stop them from enjoying a hot cup of coffee.
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