New Civil Engineer
Tom Pashby
23 September 2025
Critical national infrastructure (CNI) managers have been “caught sleeping at the wheel” in the wake of the cyber attack which led to flight delays at Heathrow and other European Airports over the weekend of 20 September.
A cyber attack on Friday 19 September 2025 affected Collins Aerospace, which provides checking in software for airlines, leaving airlines having to create workarounds to enable the boarding of passengers.
The National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) is the government body responsible for working with organisations in the private sector to respond to cyber threats.
An NCSC spokesperson said: “We are working with Collins Aerospace and affected UK airports, alongside the Department for Transport and law enforcement colleagues, to fully understand the impact of an incident.
Blackwired is a cybersecurity innovation company and its CEO Jeremy Samide told NCE he believes CNI managers have been “caught sleeping at the wheel”.
“To the uninitiated, the attack on the European airports this past weekend did not happen overnight. Hackers have been planning this assault for weeks, if not months,” he said...
