CDK Global testing DMS restoration for a small group of dealers

There appears to be a light at the end of the tunnel for the CDK Global dealership management systems (DMS) outages that have hampered business operations for around 15,000 dealerships across the country. Yet, as many have pointed out, full, uninterrupted restoration is not as easy as flipping a switch. 

Quick catch-up: Dealerships have been impaired by critical systems outages for nine days due to two cyberattacks targeting software provider CDK Global. The perpetrators are a well-known organized crime group based in Eastern Europe and are reportedly demanding tens of millions of dollars in ransom money. 

Huge win for dealers: On Wednesday, June 26, CDK announced that the company successfully restored system access to a “small initial test group” of dealers. Once validation is complete, they will begin phasing in other dealerships. CDG news confirmed that Beck Toyota in Indianapolis, Indiana, had regained access to their CDK DMS. 

Yet, as the dust settles, dealers, CDK, and the automotive industry overall face lingering questions, lawsuits, and audits. 

Sharon Kitzman, president of Dominion DMS (a competitor to CDK), told Automotive News that manufacturers have plans to audit all DMS providers to expose vulnerabilities and implement more effective cybersecurity protocols. 

“We’ve already been contacted by multiple manufacturers that we are already certified with, for their integrations for things like warranty, claims and parts ordering,” Kitzman said. “They're just letting us know that they will be auditing all of the DMS providers that they are certified with.”

What’s more? CDK is starting to get slapped with lawsuits. Yuriy Loginov filed a potential class-action suit over the weekend. Loginov alleges that CDK “failed to properly maintain and monitor the computer network and systems that housed” private information. He said he is “now at a current, imminent, and ongoing risk of fraud and identity theft” because of “negligent conduct” from the company, Quartz reports.

But it’s still unclear if private consumer data was compromised during the ransom. 

If unencrypted customer data is involved, dealers may have more paperwork to file on top of everything else. Brad Miller, Chief Regulatory and Compliance Officer and Head of Legal for Comply Auto said that under new additions to the Safeguards Rule, it's possible that a notice to the FTC may have to be sent by dealers including certain information about the event, such as the number of consumers affected, or potentially affected, as well as additional information.

Looking ahead: One of the biggest questions on dealers’ minds right now is to close out the month, given that CDK says most DMS will not be restored until June 30. Can only hope patience is exercised for the dealer community. The sheer amount of manual data entry and deal reconciling ahead of them will be a beast to tackle.

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