Transport for London CTO says hackers disrupted Dial a Ride service for the disabled

Transport for London said the cyber attack it suffered last week affected its Dial-a-Ride service, a free door-to-door transit service for disabled people.

 

In a statement released earlier this month, the transportation company said that it was “dealing with an ongoing cyber security incident” but assured riders that none of its essential operations were compromised or disrupted.

 

“At present, there is no evidence that any customer data has been compromised and there has been no impact on TfL services. The security of our systems and customer data is very important to us, and we have taken immediate action to prevent any further access to our systems,” TfL said.

 

The transportation service said it is working with relevant law enforcement authorities, including the National Crime Agency and the National Cyber Security Centre, to respond to the incident.

 

In an update, the company’s chief technology officer Shashi Verma said the cyber attack affected Tfl’s Dial a Ride service, which provides door-to-door transit for elderly and disabled people.

 

“The booking system for Dial-a-Ride was also temporarily unavailable - although pre-existing bookings were still fulfilled - again as a result of the internal measures implemented by us. Essential bookings are now able to be made again by phone and we are looking to return a full call centre service in the coming days,” Verma said.

 

Verma added that the company will “continually monitor who is accessing our systems to ensure only those authorised can gain access.  We identified some suspicious activity on Sunday and took action to limit access. A thorough investigation is currently taking place and we are working closely with the National Crime Agency and the National Cyber Security Centre to respond to the incident.”

 

Tfl has restricted access to customer journey history for pay as you go contactless customers and to some live travel data via apps including TfL Go and the TfL website, including next train information and the TfL JamCams.