UNFI cyberattack disrupts supply chain nationwide

United Natural Foods faces fallout from a cyberattack impacting Whole Foods.

United Natural Foods Inc. (UNFI), the grocery distributor for Whole Foods Market, owned by Amazon Inc., is dealing with the aftermath of a cyberattack that disrupted its operations and left some store shelves empty.

The company aims to restore its systems by June 15 in order to resume regular product deliveries. On June 5, UNFI shut down its IT systems and began limiting orders after detecting a network intrusion as part of an attempted cyberattack.

UNFI CEO Sandy Douglas stated on June 10 that the company is working with its customers to implement short-term solutions while it strives to fully restore the affected systems.

A cyberattack that disrupted the entire supply chain

The incident caused a nationwide disruption, affecting all business systems, from order management to picking and shipping.

According to Bloomberg News, by June 9, store shelves in a Whole Foods supermarket in Manhattan—typically stocked with products like ice cream, white bread, and yogurt—were already empty. A Whole Foods spokesperson said the company is working to restock shelves as soon as possible, while UNFI continues addressing the security breach.

To meet its target of resuming operations by June 15, UNFI is working with cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike Holdings Inc., which is assisting in the incident response.

Anonymous sources reported that on June 6, following the cyberattack, several employees were sent home. However, company leadership was unable to contact them to let them know not to report to work, as communication systems were down. Later, on June 8, some forklift operators were asked to return and began preparing shipments manually, using pen and paper, in anticipation that UNFI would soon be able to resume order processing, Transport Topics reported.

National Co+op Grocers, a commercial partner of UNFI, informed its representatives that it was making special requests to the distributor to continue supplying at least some of the most in-demand products. According to an internal message dated June 8 and cited by Bloomberg News, the organization described this as the “best and only option” available at the moment to resume UNFI deliveries and ensure products reach Whole Foods shelves.

The growing problem of cyberattacks in freight and logistics

In his June 10 statement, Douglas noted that UNFI first detected unusual network activity on June 5, and by the evening of June 6 had gathered enough information to justify a full network shutdown.

Andrew Howell, Vice President of Government Affairs at cybersecurity firm SentinelOne Inc., told Transport Topics that incidents like this show how the convenience of grocery shopping relies on tightly connected supply chains that are vulnerable because they are controlled by information technology systems.

He pointed out that one of the core strengths of the U.S. economy over the past two decades has been its ability to deliver goods just in time, both nationally and globally. However, events like this recent cyberattack highlight the fragility of that logistics system, whose efficiency can quickly unravel in the face of technological disruptions.