June 17, 2020—Honda recently acknowledged that it has, in recent days, dealt with a cyber attack that has impacted its operations around the world, including at U.S. dealerships.
"Honda can confirm that a cyber-attack has taken place on the Honda network," the Japanese OEM said in a statement, as noted in a BBC report. "There is also an impact on production systems outside of Japan."
Honda added that the problem affected its ability to access its computer servers, use email, and otherwise make use of its internal system. The OEM said one of its internal servers was attacked externally. It added that the virus had spread throughout its network.
According to the BBC report, cyber-security experts said it appears to be a ransomware attack, which means hackers may have encrypted data, or locked Honda out of some of its IT systems.
D.J. Mitchell, co-owner of four MITCHCO Collision Repair locations, was made aware of the issue late last week.
"Honda was shut down nationwide," Mitchell said. "Honda dealerships ... they couldn't access service records or anything.
'It's been a rough go the last seven days," added Mitchell, who is also a FenderBender columnist.