London Drugs has issued a formal apology letter to its customers for its abrupt closure of Western Canada stores after a cyberattack.
The cyberattack shut down 79 retail locations across B.C., Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba for roughly six days.
“I want to begin by expressing my sincere apologies for the inconvenience and any concerns that may have arisen from the cybersecurity incident against London Drugs,” Clint Mahlman, London Drugs president and chief operating officer, said in the letter.
“As soon as we became aware of suspicious activity in our environment, we immediately engaged third-party cybersecurity specialists from across North America to assist with containment, mitigation, and to conduct a forensic investigation.
“As of (May 8), we have found no evidence that our customer databases, including health data or LD Extras data, were compromised.”
Global News spoke with Mahlman over the phone on Wednesday as well.
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“I need to thank the amazing outreach and support from our customers. The customer love has been inspirational, emotional and highly motivating for our employees,” he said.
Mahlman said the infrastructure and data network which was attacked took “decades and decades” to create.
“It all had to be rebuilt in one week,” he said.
“Imagine trying to rebuild a company in a week, from scratch.”
All of the 79 stores that were closed were reopened on Tuesday.
The company’s president said a lot of the third-party systems used by the retail chain are still being worked through to be brought online.
“While we are open, we beg for a little more forgiveness and patience as we connect to some of our other systems,” he said.
“It has been devastating to London Drugs, we take enormous pride. And not being able to take care of our customers has been just devastating to our employees.”
No details have been released about the attack itself.
Mahlman said none of their systems have been activated without double and “triple” checks.
He said the investigation into the incident is still ongoing, and also gave thanks to the company’s customer base for their support.
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