Cybercriminals launched their attack last month (September 22nd), resulting in Giant Pay having to shut down their whole network. The shutdown included IT infrastructure, phone, and email systems.
The Giant Group issued a statement to all its contractors explaining it was “protocol” for systems to be shut down following a cyber-attack, apologising that they were unable to communicate with their subcontractors as quickly and openly as they wanted to.
How the cyber-attack affected pay
The cyber-attack caused issues for subcontractors who were left out of pocket and were not paid on time. The slow communication meant many of their subcontractors were left irate with the lack of information and updates. Giant Group responded to these emotions with hopes to have the pay issues resolved by the end of the week.
A Giant Pay subcontractor wrote on Monday evening, “This is now really frustrating. Like everyone else, I was waiting to get paid on September 24th (when it was confirmed payments would be processed), but I did not receive any communication from them. It was later in the evening on Friday that I saw the message on their website.”
The subcontractor added, “Now, this is Monday evening, September 27th, we still haven’t received any form of communications from Giant Pay, neither have they updated us on what exactly is going on.”
The nature of the attack
Giant declined to explain what the nature of the attack was. Still, CEO Phil Pluck of trade body Freelancer & Contractor Services Association, which the umbrella company co-founded, said, “Giant’s systems have indeed been locked, externally and maliciously.’
Going forward
We recently carried out a penetration test for Wise, a technology specialist providing subcontractor workforce software solutions for payroll, recruitment, invoicing, and onboarding.
Wise takes their cybersecurity seriously, having regular penetration tests, allowing us to access its system and conduct in-depth tests to identify any security risks that could make Wise vulnerable to external threats.
If you want to work with a company that takes paying their subcontractors seriously, head to Wise https://withwise.com/.
Interested in confirming your cybersecurity is actually secure, contact us or head to Cyber Essentials and Penetration testing to find out more.
