Cyberattack leaves lamb exports stranded in the real world

afr.com:

Ararat Meat Exports has at least $1 million worth of frozen lamb and mutton waiting to be loaded onto ships at Swanson Dock in Melbourne.

General manager Ted Rogers reckons the containers will arrive at their destinations in the United States and Middle East at least 10 days after they were scheduled to arrive, which means the company will have to cop late payments from customers.

“They usually pay when [the shipments] arrive, so it puts us a week or fortnight behind at least,” Mr Rogers said, adding there was no risk of spoilage.

DP World Australia boss Nicolaj Noes says it could be days before containers stuck at ports are collected. Oscar Colman

The exporter is one of many Australian companies caught up in the fallout from the cybersecurity attack on major port operator DP World on Friday.

Mr Rogers said the hack on DP World’s systems had exacerbated delays caused by ongoing industrial action.

“The strikes are causing us more grief than this cyberattack,” he said.

The cyberattack left 30,000 containers of consumer goods stranded at its terminals in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Freemantle on Sunday.

The Dubai-controlled stevedore, which handles 40 per cent of the country’s international freight, reopened the gates to its east coast landside operations early on Monday morning, and said it expected to move 5000 containers out of the four affected terminals over the course of the day.

But it also warned of further delays in coming days as it worked through a backlog of delayed shipments – and companies are concerned about the knock-on effects for future orders.

The owner of a separate NSW-based premium foods exporter, who asked to remain anonymous, told The Australian Financial Review he had more than 10 containers