The Dublin Airport Authority (DAA) said on Sunday that the financial information of some of its staff had been compromised by a ransomware attack on management consulting firm Aon last month.

In a statement, a spokesperson for the body said: "DAA can confirm that as a result of a recent cyberattack on Aon, a third-party professional service provider, data relating to some employees’ pay and benefits was compromised. DAA takes the security of sensitive personal information extremely seriously and has notified the Data Protection Commission. DAA is offering support, advice and assistance to employees impacted by this cyberattack.”

A report from the Sunday Times goes into more detail on the incident, explaining that DAA was one of many global companies affected by a cyberattack on Aon, and specifically its MOVEit file transfer software tool. The attack affected nearly 2,000 Dublin airport staff along with other agencies and companies in the US and UK.

Irish airline Aer Lingus is another impacted firm, with a spokesperson for the company saying: “It has been confirmed that no financial or bank details relating to Aer Lingus current or former employees were compromised in this incident. It has also been confirmed that no phone contact details relating to Aer Lingus current or former employees were compromised.

"The third-party provider has confirmed that the incident has been contained and that they have officially notified the Data Protection Commissioner and the National Cyber Security Centre, as has Aer Lingus.”

Last month, Microsoft linked the exploitation of a critical flaw in the MOVEit application to a threat actor identified as Lace Tempest. Lace Tempest is a criminal ransomware group that is also known to operate the Cl0p extortion site that threatens to display intercepted data on a website if victims fail to pay for the information’s return.

At least over 3,000 exposed hosts were identified as potential victims of the exploit in early June. Other companies including British Airways, Boots and BBC have all fallen foul of the ransomware.

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