Colonial Pipeline Ransomware Attack The major cyberattack that Colonial Pipeline became aware of on Friday, May 7, 2021, caused the company to completely shut down its pipelines that afternoon. The Colonial Pipeline delivers approximately 45% of the supply of gasoline to the Southeast and is one of the nation’s most critical pipelines for refined oil products.
to contain the threat, which halted its pipeline operations and affected some internal systems. Colonial Pipeline began to slowly restart the fuel pipeline network on May 12 and advised it would take several more days to return to normal operations. As the shutdown lengthened, challenges and shortages due to panic buying began to be felt in Southeastern states, especially Georgia, Tennessee, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, Mississippi, and Alabama, and to a lesser extent, Northern Florida. Nearly 60% of gas stations in metro Atlanta were without gasoline, tracking firm GasBuddy said. Its survey showed 65% of stations in North Carolina and 43% in Georgia and South Carolina without fuel. Virginia also reported high outages. A news release issued on Monday, May 10 in the name of the cyber group DarkSide, the criminal group the FBI suspects of the attack on the pipeline, said “our goal is to make money, and not creating problems for society.” In the aftermath of the Colonial attack, the websites of several ransomware operators, including DarkSide, disappeared from the web.
Apparently late that Friday, Colonial Pipeline became aware of a ransomware attack, an attack where hackers encrypt computers until a company pays a ransom and the hackers unlock the computers. Various levels of government, including the FBI and White House, were aware of the attack and aided Colonial Pipeline, understanding this pipeline is vital to the area’s transportation needs. Colonial Pipeline Co. said on May 10 it was working with the U.S. Department of Energy to bring its system back online following the May 7 cyberattack, with the goal of substantially restoring operational service by the end of the week. Although it wasn’t known if the affected computers directly operated the pipeline, Colonial said in a press release it had proactively taken systems offline
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