SPAR stores switched to cash only after suspected cyberattack
International Supermarket franchise SPAR which operates around 13,00 stores in more than 45 countries has been affected by a Security incident. Around 330 stores in Northeast England faced a cyber attack and were switch to cash only payments.
Lawrence Hunt & Co Ltd which operates few branches across the county, says that the outage affected tills, credit cards and back-office systems across the SPAR network.
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Preston food distributor James Hall and Co who provides stocks to SPAR stores for North England says that they were also affected by the attacked.
“We are currently aware of an online attack on our IT systems. This has affected around 330 SPAR stores across the North of England over the past 24 hours and we are working to resolve this situation as quickly as possible.”
“It is currently impacting stores’ ability to process card payments meaning that a number of SPAR stores are currently closed to shoppers or only taking cash payments.”
“We apologies for the inconvenience this is causing our customers and we are working as quickly as possible to resolve the situation.” said a spokesman for James Hall & Co.
They company has not official disclosed anything of an cyberattack yet, but the signs show of a ransomware attack has locked down the crucial IT systems.
Some SPAR shops are opened but operates on Cash payments while some stores remains closed. UK’s national cybersecurity center (NCSC) informed consumers that they are aware of this Incident and working on the evaluation.
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