The EU’s cyber security agency says criminals are using ransomware to cause chaos in airports around the world.
Several of Europe’s busiest airports have spent the past few days trying to restore normal operations, after a cyber-attack on Friday disrupted their automatic check-in and boarding software.
The European Union Agency for Cybersecurity, ENISA, told the BBC on Monday that the malicious software was used to scramble automatic check-in systems.
“The type of ransomware has been identified. Law enforcement is involved to investigate,” the agency said in a statement to news agency Reuters.
It’s not known who is behind the attack, but criminal gangs often use ransomware to seriously disrupt their victims’ systems and demand a ransom in bitcoin to reverse the damage.
The BBC has seen internal crisis communications from staff inside Heathrow Airport which urges airlines to continue to use manual workarounds to board and check in passengers as the recovery is ongoing.
Heathrow said on Sunday it was still working to resolve the issue, and apologised to customers who had faced delayed travel.
It stressed “the vast majority of flights have continued to operate” and urged passengers to check their flight status before travelling to the airport.
The BBC understands about half of the airlines flying from Heathrow were back online in some form by Sunday – including British Airways, which has been using a back-up system since Saturday.
The attack against US software maker Collins Aerospace was discovered on Friday night and resulted in disruption across several airports on Saturday.
While this had eased significantly in Berlin and London Heathrow by Sunday, delays and flight cancellations remained.
Brussels Airport, also affected, said the “service provider is actively working on the issue” but it was still “unclear” when the issue would be resolved.
They have asked airlines to cancel nearly 140 of their 276 scheduled outbound flights for Monday, according to the AP news agency.
Meanwhile, a Berlin Airport spokesperson told the BBC some airlines were still boarding passengers manually and it had no indication on how long the electronic outage would last. (BBC News)
