Coca-Cola bottler reportedly hit with ransomware

Viking Coca-Cola, a Coca-Cola bottling company, was uploaded to a dark web blog known as a leak site that criminals use to showcase their latest victims.

Russia-linked cybercriminal cartel Black Basta supposedly breached Viking Coca-Cola, a US-based manufacturing company specializing in bottles and cans. The company is one of the largest Coca-Cola bottlers in the US.

Usually, organizations appear on a ransomware gang’s site after threat actors have breached the company and stolen its data. We contacted the company for comment but did not receive a reply before publishing.

Black Basta did not disclose what type of data cybercriminals might have taken from the company. However, the post on the syndicate’s blog shows that no data has been leaked so far, indicating that negotiations might still be taking place.

The alleged breach was first reported by security researcher Dominic Alvieri.

Black Basta first appeared in 2022, hitting dozens of companies in its first few weeks. According to the dark-web monitoring platform DarkFeed, Black Basta has struck 153 organizations since its strain of malware was first discovered.

The gang employs double-extortion tactics to muscle victims into paying a ransom. Cybercriminals that use this model often publish stolen data bit by bit, expecting victims to succumb to internal and external pressure.

Researchers believe that Black Basta operators are associated with the notorious Russia-linked cybercrime gang FIN7, reported in November last year as having been active players in the cyber espionage underworld for around a decade.