Japanese beverage giant Asahi Group Holdings Ltd. said Thursday an investigation has found that personal information linked to around 2 million customers and employees may have been leaked in a cyberattack that hit its domestic servers in late September.

Asahi President Atsushi Katsuki apologized at a press conference in Tokyo, its first since the company was hit by a system failure on Sept. 29. He said the company expects to resume orders and shipments, currently being handled manually, from December once the system is restored, with the normalization of logistics operations eyed by February.

The personal information that has or may have been leaked includes the names, gender, addresses, phone numbers and email addresses of 1.53 million individuals who contacted the customer service centers of Asahi Breweries Ltd., Asahi Soft Drinks Co. and Asahi Group Foods Ltd.

Katsuki said it is evident that cybersecurity was "weak," noting a negative impact on earnings "cannot be prevented."

Shipping volumes remain reduced, with orders being taken by telephone and fax. Asahi has also postponed releasing its earnings results for January to September, initially scheduled for Nov. 12.

A hacker group named Qilin claimed responsibility for the cyberattack on Asahi Group, saying in a post on the dark web that it had stolen employee information and internal documents, according to a cybersecurity source.

Asahi said while the attack has affected its systems in Japan, no impact overseas has been confirmed.

The cyberattack used ransomware, a type of malicious software that encrypts data and renders it inaccessible until a ransom is paid, but Katsuki denied Asahi had made any payment.

==Kyodo

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