The automobile manufacturer said it is still investigating the extent of the breach and has notified the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) about the incident. According to the Toyota Kirloskar Motors (TKM) website, the carmaker has over 1 million customers in India. It is not clear at present, though, how many customers have been impacted. The breach is the latest high-profile cyber episode Toyota has faced as a global company in the last year.
Very Little Known About Toyota India Breach
TKM has revealed very little information about the cybersecurity incident up until now. Apart from a lack of information on the number of people affected and the nature of data involved, TKM has not elaborated on the cyber incident nor named the service provider affected. “Toyota Kirloskar Motor (TKM) has been notified by one of its service providers of an incident that might have exposed personal information of some of TKM’s customers on the internet,” the statement reads. However, TKM stated it would work on preventing similar incidents in the future. “Considering this incident, TKM will work with its service provider to further enhance the existing extensive guidelines being followed and is fully committed to avoid any kind of inconvenience to our esteemed customers,” TKM said. “We sincerely apologise for any concern this may have caused to our customers.”
Recent Cyber Incidents Involving Toyota Motors
Toyota found itself in the news following several high-profile cyber incidents in 2022. In October, the company revealed that the data of its T-Connect app users — an estimated 296,019 Toyota customers’ email addresses and customer management numbers — had been left exposed since 2017. Earlier in the year, one of the company’s major parts suppliers suffered a debilitating cyber attack. The incident, which occurred in February, forced Toyota to shut down all its manufacturing plants in Japan temporarily. At the time, the company estimated it would lose the output of up to 13,000 cars. Later in March, another one of Toyota’s automotive parts manufacturing partners, DENSO, suffered a ransomware attack on its Germany-based network. In that instance, the responsible actors infected DENSO’s network with Pandora ransomware and stole 1.4 TB worth of data. In today’s digital world, most of our daily tools and devices, including our cars, are connected to the internet. If this story piqued your interest, we recommend reading up about the privacy risks associated with your car to keep yourself in the know.
