Pete Buttigieg inherited a global supply chain crisis when he became President Joe Biden's transportation secretary. He didn't cause every factory shutdown, port closure, or labor shortage during the pandemic shutdown, but his job was to get freight moving again.
By July 2021, the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach handled about 40% of America's containerized freight while the administration still described the disruptions as transitory.
Task forces and roundtables followed, but families and businesses kept waiting for parts, appliances, vehicles, and basic goods.
U.S. Department of Transportation:
The Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach together serve as major gateways to international trade. Approximately 40 percent of all containerized freight flowing through the United States arrives or departs through these ports.
“For the past year, those who work at our ports, including our longshore workers, terminal operators, and truckers, have stepped up to keep freight moving and our economy running,” said Secretary Buttigieg. “For our economy to fully recover, we now need our vital supply chains to operate smoothly and without avoidable congestion. Today’s conversation represents a chance for us to come together and find solutions for American consumers, workers, and small businesses.”
“The lingering impact of the pandemic has placed challenges on agriculture shipping and has left our farmers struggling to get their products to willing buyers,” said Deputy Secretary Bronaugh. “We have an opportunity to build back our markets better than before and ensure that more U.S. products are successfully being sent around the world. Today’s roundtable gives me hope that we will seek solutions that will not only benefit agriculture, but every sector of the supply chain.”
While the Biden-Harris Administration continues to believe supply chain disruptions are transitory, the Administration is focused on addressing these challenges using all of the tools at its disposal. Last month, the President announced the Supply Chain Disruptions Task Force to bring the full capacity of the federal government to address near-term supply/demand mismatches. Today’s roundtable is part of that effort.
The COVID-19 shutdown showed how quickly American prosperity can stall when goods stop moving. Lockdowns, logistics failure, and sudden shifts in demand placed extreme pressure on producers of critical goods.
Buttigieg's weak response stretched the pain and left the country with a lesson it should never forget: supply chains belong inside America's national security planning.
A cyberattack creates a worse kind of breakdown because the machinery may keep running. Modern manufacturers rely on inventory records, supplier files, production schedules, shipping updates, and demand forecasts.
Hackers who alter those records can make nonexistent stock appear available, redirect deliveries, trigger useless purchase orders, or leave vital components unordered.
Employees and automated systems may keep acting on false information because the data still looks legitimate.
The damage can survive the original breach; corrupted records can distort budgets, forecasts, and artificial intelligence models months after attackers leave the network.
A company may restore its servers and still make decisions from a damaged history. Production slows, costs rise, and managers lose precious time checking information that once moved automatically.
Foreign enemies already understand the opportunity. Russian military hackers have targeted Western logistics and technology companies, seeking access to transportation routes, shipment information, and organizations supporting Ukraine. From America's Cyber Defense Agency:
Today, CISA, the National Security Agency, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and other U.S. and international partners released a joint Cybersecurity Advisory, Russian GRU Targeting Western Logistics Entities and Technology Companies.
This advisory details a Russian state-sponsored cyber espionage-oriented campaign targeting technology companies and logistics entities, including those involved in the coordination, transport, and delivery of foreign assistance to Ukraine.
Russian General Staff Main Intelligence Directorate (GRU) 85th Main Special Service Center, military unit 26165 cyber actors are using a mix of previously disclosed tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) and are likely connected to these actors’ widescale targeting of IP cameras in Ukraine and bordering NATO nations.
Executives and network defenders at logistics entities and technology companies should recognize the elevated threat of until 26165 targeting, increase monitoring and threat hunting for known TTPs and indicators of compromise, and posture network defenses with a presumption of targeting. For more information on Russian state-sponsored threat actor activity, see CISA’s Russia Cyber Threat Overview and Advisories page.
Industrial control systems face attacks that can threaten production, physical safety, and the integrity of manufactured data.
President Donald Trump's 2026 cyber strategy calls for hardening critical infrastructure, securing information and operational technology supply chains, denying adversaries access, and recovering quickly after an attack.
The policy points in the right direction: execution must reach ports, rail networks, trucking systems, warehouses, defense contractors, food processors, drug manufacturers, energy suppliers, and the smaller vendors connected to them.
America needs more than firewalls and emergency press conferences. Critical operators should maintain verified offline backups, limit access to essential systems, record every major data change, test for unusual activity, and practice restoring clean information under pressure.
Manufacturing Business Technology:
Every stage of the supply chain relies on trusted information moving between manufacturers, suppliers, logistics providers, warehouses, distributors and retailers. When attackers manipulate that information, even small changes can influence decisions across multiple departments and systems.
For example, altered inventory records may indicate that products are available when stock levels are actually depleted. Manipulated supplier information can lead to incorrect purchase orders, while compromised shipping schedules may cause unnecessary delays or result in products being delivered to the wrong locations. These errors can quickly compound as inaccurate information continues to circulate throughout connected systems.
Unlike a complete system failure, compromised data often appears legitimate. Employees and automated platforms continue using the information without realizing it has been altered, allowing the effects of the attack to spread throughout the organization.
Effective supply chain optimization depends on reliable information. Even advanced analytics and AI models cannot produce accurate recommendations when the underlying data has been corrupted. Inaccurate data can distort demand forecasts, misalign production schedules, create inventory shortages or overstock, and lead to inefficient transportation plans. Procurement teams may order unnecessary materials while critical components remain unavailable, increasing costs and operational delays.
The impact extends beyond day-to-day operations. Historical data supports forecasting, budgeting and machine learning models, meaning corrupted information can continue influencing business decisions long after the original cyberattack has been contained. Organizations may also lose confidence in their own reporting. As departments spend more time validating data before making decisions, operational agility declines, making it harder to respond quickly to changing market conditions.
Federal contracts should require strong data-integrity plans from suppliers whose failures could interrupt military readiness or essential civilian needs. Companies also require independent checks on inventory, routing, and supplier records before corrupted information spreads through connected systems unexpectedly.
Buttigieg's tenure showed what happens when visible bottlenecks meet sluggish leadership. The next supply chain attack may arrive without ships waiting offshore or empty loading docks on television.
America could discover the damage only after factories build the wrong products, trucks head to the wrong destination, and critical supplies fail to arrive.
Protecting the data behind the supply chain is now part of protecting the country.
