Colonial Pipeline ransomware halts East Coast fuel flow

On 07/05/2021, COLONIAL PIPELINE shut pipeline operations to contain a DarkSide ransomware intrusion in its IT network. The FBI publicly confirmed DarkSide on 10/05/2021. Huntress reports attackers used stolen VPN credentials lacking MFA and exfiltrated ~100 GB of data before encryption. Colonial restarted the pipeline on 12/05/2021 after a six‑day shutdown and paid a $4.4 million ransom, with fuel shortages and emergency measures across the U.S. East Coast and Southeast.