Asahi: a ransomware attack that left Japan short of beer

In late September 2025, a ransomware attack stopped orders and shipments at Asahi, Japan’s leading brewer. The company went back to taking orders by hand. Lessons on keeping a business running.

On 29 September 2025, Asahi Group, one of Japan’s biggest brewers, announced a cyberattack that disrupted its systems in Japan. Order processing, shipping and customer service stopped, and its breweries had to suspend production.

The consequences

• Shortages of Asahi products, including its flagship Super Dry beer, in shops and convenience stores.
• Launches of new products planned for October postponed.
• The ransomware group Qilin claimed the attack and said it had stolen about 27 GB of data.
• Asahi later said personal data of up to about 1.5 million people may have been exposed.

Back to manual

To restart, Asahi set up a temporary manual ordering system, taking orders without its usual software. Production and shipments resumed gradually. That fallback mode let the company keep serving part of its customers while systems were rebuilt.

Lessons for any business

• Know how you would take an order or confirm a delivery if your software stopped tomorrow.
• Keep isolated backups, and test restoring them regularly.
• Separate critical systems, so one intrusion cannot stop everything.
• Prepare your communication to customers and partners in advance.

Continuity is a competitive advantage

Every business will face an outage one day, whether from an attack or a simple failure. Those that recover fastest are those that prepared a simple, tested plan B.

A plan B written on paper is worth more than a perfect system that is down.

Sources: Asahi statements, BleepingComputer, The Record, Computer Weekly, CyberInsider, 2025.

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