Cyberattack on Manchester Airports Group exposes data of 8.7 million customers

Manchester Airports Group (MAG) — a public-private partnership which operates three of England’s busiest airports — said Thursday it was hit by a cyberattack affecting data belonging to about 8.7 million customers.

According to the company’s announcement, an unauthorized third party recently accessed customer data associated with car park, lounge and Fast Track bookings, as well as in-airport Wi-Fi sign-ups at the Manchester, London Stansted and East Midlands airports.

MAG did not disclose how the attackers gained access to the relevant system, nor did it set out what the attackers did while inside beyond accessing customer data. The three airports handled more than 65 million passengers last year, although not all of these would have interacted with the affected services.

The compromised information includes email addresses, phone numbers, vehicle registrations and postcodes. The company said neither it nor the affected system stores customers’ bank or payment card details and that no financial data was exposed.

A spokesperson told The Yorkshire Post that roughly 8.7 million people were impacted, although they did not provide a date range. They added that in the “vast majority” of cases, the only information accessed was an email address.

MAG said it was alerted to the incident Tuesday. The company said it believes the attackers first accessed customer data a few days before the intrusion was discovered, and that it sought to contain the breach by restricting access to affected systems, bringing in outside cybersecurity specialists and notifying relevant authorities.

Passenger safety and aviation security have not been affected, said the company, which added that flights, airport operations and parking services continue to operate normally.

As a precaution, the company has temporarily suspended its online Manage My Booking service. MAG said all upcoming reservations remain valid and customers do not need to take action unless they need to change a booking within the next 72 hours. Those customers are being directed to a customer service phone line.

The company is majority-owned by ten Greater Manchester local authorities, with Australian fund IFM Investors holding a minority stake

MAG said it has emailed affected customers and warned them to be alert for phishing attempts. The company stressed it will never contact customers unexpectedly to request payment card details, banking information or passwords.