Cyber Attack Displays ‘Islamophobic’ Message on U.K. Trains, Officials Say

The British authorities are investigating after commuters at 19 train stations saw an Islamophobic message when they tried to log on to a public Wi-Fi system.

The British authorities are investigating a cyberattack on Wednesday that they said displayed an anti-Muslim message on a public Wi-Fi system serving more than a dozen train stations around the country.

Commuters who connected to a Wi-Fi service at stations for Network Rail, Britain’s national rail operator, were met with “Islamophobic messaging,” according to the British Transport Police, who oversee law enforcement on British rail networks. The police said they had received reports of the cyberattack just after 5 p.m. local time, and that they were leading an investigation into the incident. The service was quickly taken down, Network Rail said, and would remain down until security checks were completed.

The issue emerged at 19 stations across Britain, including major transportation hubs in London, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Bristol and other cities, a spokesman for Network Rail said in a statement.

Commuters attempting to log onto Wi-Fi at the stations were met with a webpage that said “We love you, Europe,” along with information related to terror attacks in Europe, The Manchester Evening News reported.

The Wi-Fi was a “click-and-connect” service that did not collect any personal data and was operated by a third-party company, Telent, Network Rail’s statement said.

Telent, a technology and communications company, on Thursday pointed to Global Reach, a provider that ran the Wi-Fi service’s landing page. Telent said in an emailed statement that the incident had been “an act of cyber vandalism, which originated from within the Global Reach network and was not a result of a network security breach or a technical failure.” The company said it aimed to restore public Wi-Fi services by the weekend, and that it was cooperating with the authorities.

British Transport Police were investigating the matter as a criminal case, Telent said, and no personal data was affected by the incident. But, as a precaution, it said, it had temporarily suspended all use of Global Reach services to confirm that none of its other customers had been impacted.

In response to questions sent via email, a representative for Global Reach said, “We are aware of the cyber vandalism affecting a small number of our customers’ captive portals. We’ve taken immediate measures to eliminate the risk and protect our customers.” She added that the company was cooperating with the authorities in their investigation and could not provide more details.

Britain’s crime and cybersecurity agencies were also helping with the investigation, the Transport Police said on Thursday.

The disruption follows another “cybersecurity incident” on Sept. 1 that targeted Transport for London, the agency that runs the city’s public transit network, in which hackers accessed the contact details of the agency’s customers, and potentially could view bank account details for some commuters. The cyberattack also affected the broadcasting of live train schedules online and payment systems.

A 17-year-old was arrested in Walsall, a town in the West Midlands county of England, as part of the investigation into that attack, cybercrime authorities said this month.