Less-than-truckload carrier Central Freight Lines (CFL) confirmed it fell victim to a cyberattack, which knocked its operating systems and call center offline last week.
The Waco, Texas-based carrier’s new chief operating officer, Steve Vondra, confirmed to FreightWaves that it was targeted in a “cyber incident that impacted CFL and many other companies across the U.S.”
“We immediately engaged third-party professionals to assist and informed federal law enforcement,” Vondra said in a statement to FreightWaves.
Vondra shared few details about the systemwide attack. He said CFL isn’t aware of how the hackers infiltrated the company’s systems but said no ransomware group had demanded money from the LTL carrier.
None of the company’s data files has been leaked on the dark web, Vondra said.
“In less than a week, we were able to bring many of our systems back online and apologize to all our employees and customers who were affected by this disruption and hope to have the rest of our systems fully recovered shortly,” Vondra told FreightWaves.
Earlier on Monday, Forward Air Corp. (NASDAQ:FWRD) confirmed it was hit by a ransomware attack last week, the Tennessee-based trucking and logistics firm disclosed in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing.
Financial and legal woes continue to plague CFL.
Digital freight brokerage Mothership Technologies recently sued CFL for nearly $508,000 in unpaid invoices, citing breach of contract.
Pay cuts and layoffs have also hurt the 95-year-old carrier as it works through its financial struggles.
“We are committed to fixing our service issues and working to ensure the long-term viability of CFL,” Vondra said. “As part of our restructuring plans, we continue to work with partners, creditors and customers to save jobs, move freight and provide the best service possible.”
CFL has 1,651 power units and 1,175 drivers, according to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration SAFER website.
This is a developing story.
Nate Tabak contributed to this report.
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RIVERA LOPEZ LUIS A.
I am also a CDL holder and driver I saw the same affects done to me and the truck that I was driving for TEXOIL TRUCKING LLC. and also PLATINUM HOT SHOTS thru out the states i also notice a pattern on the roads when this occurs it’s not the first time this has happened to me and trucks systems altered or manipulation by some source of ip addresses conducted by a mobile laptop while traveling I want to bring this to HOMELAND SECURITY THANK YOU….
John
**cough** Russkies *cough***. I mean, who else would it be at this point? They took out like half the tech sector last week along a number of government agencies. Forward Air strange enough got hit the same day the federal government got it.