Nissan Australia is battling to overcome the effects of a major cyber attack.

    The Australian arm of the Japanese carmaker, and its partner company Nissan Financial Services, have been severely affected by the event.

    Some head office functions have been compromised, although Nissan Australia will not provide any details of the cyber incident or the impact on its headquarters or dealer operations.

    Even the company’s email system isn’t working.

    A week after the cyber attack, which is believed to have occurred around December 5, Nissan Australia still had little detail to offer beyond confirming the re-opening of its customer call centre.

    “We are working tirelessly to investigate the cyber incident and restore our systems to support our dealers and customers,” a spokesperson for Nissan Australia told CarExpert.

    “This week we have re-opened our customer call centre and we encourage customers to go to our website to find the latest information.”

    However, the company would not answer questions about delays in car sales or deliveries, disruption to dealer operations including the ordering of parts, or financial operations.

    Nissan Australia has only been providing updates on its official website, but has had little to share here, either.

    “Nissan is working with its global incident response team and relevant stakeholders to investigate the extent of the incident and whether any personal information has been accessed,” it said originally.

    “Nissan has also notified the Australian Cyber Security Centre and the New Zealand National Cyber Security Centre.

    “While the extent of the incident is still under investigation, Nissan encourages its customers to be vigilant across their accounts, including looking out for any unusual or scam activities.”

    A series of follow-up posts were focussed on Nissan owners.

    “We are aware that customers in Australia and New Zealand are having difficulties contacting us. We are currently working to restore our systems and we will re-establish our customer support phone lines as soon as we can,” it said.

    “We are continuing to investigate the cyber incident and we will provide further updates as soon as possible.

    “We also want to reassure customers the systems outage will not adversely impact the credit rating of any of our Nissan Financial Services customers.

    “Some dealer systems will be impacted, however your local Nissan dealership is operating. Please speak directly to your local Nissan dealer to assist with all vehicle and servicing queries.”

    CarExpert will continue to follow the story and is waiting for more information from Nissan Australia.

    Paul Gover

    Paul Gover is one of the most experienced and respected motoring journalists in Australia. After more than 40 years on the automotive beat there is nothing he has not done, yet he still brings the enthusiasm of a rookie. He has worked in print, digital, radio, television and for every major publisher in the country. He is also a national motor racing champion and once co-drove with Peter Brock at Bathurst.

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