TOEI ANIMATION CO., LTD. (the “Company”) announced today the findings, described below, of the investigation carried out regarding an unauthorized access to its network by a third party on March 6, 2022.

Further, as of today, the Company’s regular operations and anime production are more or less functioning normally.

We would like to express our deepest apologies for the tremendous concern and inconvenience caused to our customers, vendors, and other involved parties.

 

1. Background
A Company employee downloaded a software required for business from an external website, which had been tampered with so as to simultaneously download a software program that would serve as the entry point for ransomware infiltration.

Subsequently, on March 6, the Company confirmed the unauthorized access to its network by a third party.

 

2. Response and investigation
When the above-mentioned unauthorized access into its network was confirmed, the Company took various measures including immediately shutting down portions of its internal system and restricting access from outside. Moreover, the Company not only promptly reported the incident to the concerned authorities but also has been carrying out appropriate and necessary responses and investigations by involving external security specialists.

As of today, following the implementation of security measures, all the internal systems of the Company are more or less normalized.

 

3. Impact
Following the unauthorized access by a third party, portions of the data in the Company’s server and PCs were encrypted after being infected by the ransomware, which resulted in delays in parts of the regular operations and anime production for about a month.

 

4. Information leakage
The investigation by the external security specialists has not confirmed any information leakage including that of personal information.

The Company also has not received any report on damages to customers, etc.

 

5. Measures to prevent recurrence
Going forward, the Company plans to educate its employees so as to raise their knowledge of information security and also strengthen the response system to prevent unauthorized access.