Toyota Motor said it would suspend domestic factory operations on Tuesday, losing around 13,000 cars of output, after a supplier of plastic parts and electronic components was hit by a suspected cyber attack.
A Reuters report said no information was immediately available about who was behind the possible attack or the motive. The attack came just after Japan joined western allies in clamping down on Russia after it invaded Ukraine, although it was not clear if the attack was at all related.
Japanese prime minister Fumio Kishida reportedly said his government would investigate the incident and whether Russia was involved.
“It is difficult to say whether this has anything to do with Russia before making thorough checks,” he told Reuters.
A spokesperson at the supplier, Kojima Industries, told the news agency it appeared to have been the victim of some kind of cyber attack.
A spokesperson from Toyota described it to Reuters as a “supplier system failure”.
The company did not yet know if the halt at its 14 plants in Japan, which account for about a third of its global production, would last more than a day, the spokesperson added.
Some plants operated by affiliates Hino Motors and Daihatsu were included in the shutdown.
