More than 4,500 individuals were confirmed by Kansas-based Dairy Farmers of America to have had their personal details pilfered following a June cyberattack later claimed by the Play ransomware operation, reports The Record, a news site by cybersecurity firm Recorded Future.
Advanced social engineering has been employed by threat actors to infiltrate the farmer-owned dairy cooperative's systems, enabling the theft of 4,546 people's names, birthdates, Social Security numbers, bank account numbers, driver's license or state-issued ID numbers, and Medicare or Medicaid numbers, said Dairy Farmers of America in a filing with Maine regulators.
Such a disclosure comes amid the growing prevalence of ransomware intrusions against the food and agriculture sector, with the industry experiencing 84 attacks during the first quarter of 2025, which was more than two times higher than the same period last year. Meanwhile, passage of last year's bipartisan Senate legislation pushing for improved food and agriculture cyber defenses also failed.
