Ransomware attack cripples Bristol Airport's arrival and departure boards
The boards were down for two days while the company's engineers fixed the problem


Bristol Airport's departure and arrival boards haven't been working for two days after a ransomware attack affected its operation.
A spokesperson said it was necessary to take the boards down to prevent the rest of the airport's computers being affected too.
"We believe there was an online attempt to target part of our administrative systems and that required us to take a number of applications offline as a precautionary measure, including the one that provides our data for flight information screens," spokesman James Gore told the BBC.
"That was done to contain the problem and avoid any further impact on more critical systems."
However, he also added that the attack was a speculative attempt to break into the computing system rather than a targeted attack specifically on Bristol Airport and flights have not been affected as a result.
He said that safety and security of its passengers or staff were never affected and although it has taken longer to get the departure and arrival boards up and running, it was because the airport wanted to make sure other aspects of computing infrastructure wouldn't be affected.
"Given the number of safety and security critical systems operating at an airport, we wanted to make sure that the issue with the flight information application that experienced the problem was absolutely resolved before it was put back online," Gore finished.
Sign up today and you will receive a free copy of our Future Focus 2025 report - the leading guidance on AI, cybersecurity and other IT challenges as per 700+ senior executives
Engineers are now working to get the boards back up, but the airport was quick to stress that hasn't involved paying the criminals the ransom they have demanded, but quarantining and fixing the affected files.
This is not the first time tech problems have caused havoc with Gatwick's information boards, as a faulty cable knocked them offline back in August.

Clare is the founder of Blue Cactus Digital, a digital marketing company that helps ethical and sustainability-focused businesses grow their customer base.
Prior to becoming a marketer, Clare was a journalist, working at a range of mobile device-focused outlets including Know Your Mobile before moving into freelance life.
As a freelance writer, she drew on her expertise in mobility to write features and guides for ITPro, as well as regularly writing news stories on a wide range of topics.
-
Prolific ransomware operator added to Europe’s Most Wanted list as US dangles $10 million reward
News The US Department of Justice is offering a reward of up to $10 million for information leading to the arrest of Volodymyr Viktorovych Tymoshchuk, an alleged ransomware criminal.
-
Jaguar Land Rover “did the right thing” shutting down systems to thwart cyber attack
News The attack on Jaguar Land Rover highlights the growing attractiveness of the automotive sector
-
Ransomware attack on IT supplier disrupts hundreds of Swedish municipalities
News The attack on IT systems supplier Miljödata has impacted public sector services across the country
-
A notorious hacker group is ramping up cloud-based ransomware attacks
News The Storm-0501 threat group is refining its tactics, according to Microsoft, shifting away from traditional endpoint-based attacks and toward cloud-based ransomware.
-
Security researchers have just identified what could be the first ‘AI-powered’ ransomware strain – and it uses OpenAI’s gpt-oss-20b model
News Using OpenAI's gpt-oss:20b model, ‘PromptLock’ generates malicious Lua scripts via the Ollama API.
-
Data I/O shuts down systems in wake of ransomware attack
News Regulatory filings by Data I/O suggest the costs of dealing with the attack could be significant
-
Average ransom payment doubles in a single quarter
News Targeted social engineering and data exfiltration have become the biggest tactics as three major ransomware groups dominate
-
BlackSuit ransomware gang taken down in latest law enforcement sting – but members have already formed a new group
News The notorious gang has seen its servers taken down and bitcoin seized, but may have morphed into a new group called Chaos