The shipping industry is facing a sharp rise in cyber attacks as geopolitical disputes prompt state-linked hackers to target trade flows. Shipowners, ports and other maritime groups faced at least 64 cyber incidents in 2023, a review of company, media and academic reports by researchers at the Netherlands’ NHL Stenden University of Applied Sciences has found. A decade earlier, there were three, and zero in 2003.
Over 80 per cent of identified incidents since 2001 with a known attacker originated in Russia, China, North Korea or Iran, according to data from the university, which trains mariners. “The international rules-based order . . . the great system [that benefited shipping] since the second world war is under threat like never before,” said Guy Platten, secretary-general at the International Chamber of Shipping, which represents shipowners controlling about 80 per cent of the world’s commercial fleet.
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