Premier Fishing & Brands’ majority shareholder African Equity Empowerment Investments (AEEI) said the company’s CEO, Sooren Ramdenee, has been disciplined for negligence after a cyberattack that saw millions of rand siphoned from the company.
AEEI said on Monday that Premier Fishing, in which it owns a controlling stake of 56.23%, fell victim to a cyberattack in November which saw $820,000 (R15.5m) transferred from its bank account to “an unknown third party.”
“In response, Premier Fishing opened a criminal case with the SA Police Service and initiated an internal investigation,” AEEI said in a statement.
“Additionally, and following a thorough investigation and disciplinary proceedings, the CEO of Premier Fishing was found guilty of negligence, and appropriate action has been taken in this regard. Efforts to recover the misappropriated funds are ongoing, and the board of directors of AEEI is committed to exploring all available avenues for their recovery.”
AEEI did not detail the measures it took against Ramdenee and why he was held accountable for the breach.
The theft took place just months after Premier Fishing completed its delisting from the JSE via a scheme of arrangement.
The company said at the time that its delisting was meant to free up management’s time to focus on strengthening existing offerings and markets, organic growth, and identifying suitable acquisitions to expand the group.
AEEI itself is in the process of delisting from the JSE.
Interpol’s 2022 Africa Cyberthreat Assessment report showed SA leads the continent in the number of cybersecurity threats identified, after it registered 230-million threat detections that year.
Virodh Sunderlall, product manager at services and solutions aggregator Tarsus On Demand, said SA companies are particularly vulnerable because of affordability challenges.
“More developed countries have more funds available to buy multiple security systems. Our economy has not been at its strongest, so people try to lower expenditure by cutting expenses that don’t generate money, such as security and insurance. This leaves enterprises open to attack,” Sunderlall said.
“With cyber threats becoming more sophisticated and diverse, relying on a single security layer is no longer sufficient. Multilayered security involves combining different security measures such as firewalls, encryption, access controls, behavioural analytics, and endpoint protection to create robust defences against potential breaches.”
Khumalok@businesslive.co.za
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