Manchester Airports Group hit by cyber security incident affecting 8.7 million customers

Three major UK airports have been hit by a "cyber security incident" in which criminal hackers accessed the data of almost nine million people and demanded a ransom.

Manchester Airports Group (MAG), which owns Manchester, East Midlands and London Stansted airports, said customers' contact details, vehicle registrations and postcodes were obtained by hackers at the weekend.

MAG told the BBC the hackers demanded a ransom fee for the return of the data, which the group said it refused to pay. The sum of the ransom fee was not disclosed.

The firm said "at no point has passenger safety or aviation security been compromised" and the system hacked did not hold customers' bank or payment details.

The data of about 8.7 million customers was accessed.

The majority of the data accessed was restricted to customer email addresses and related to WiFi sign-ups within the airports' terminals, MAG said.

MAG said in a statement: "We would like to reassure customers that Manchester Airport Group takes the security of customer information extremely seriously and we apologise for any inconvenience or concern caused."