Aircraft maker Airbus on Wednesday revealed that information on some of its employees was compromised as a result of a data breach.
According to the company, it detected an intrusion on systems associated with its Commercial Aircraft business, but claims that the incident has not impacted its commercial operations.
The aerospace giant provided few details about the breach, but it did admit that the attackers accessed some data, which it claims is mostly “professional contact and IT identification details” of some employees in Europe. The company is trying to determine if the hackers targeted any specific data.
“This incident is being thoroughly investigated by Airbus’ experts who have taken immediate and appropriate actions to reinforce existing security measures and to mitigate its potential impact, as well as determining its origins,” Airbus said in a statement.
The company says it has contacted authorities, including as required by the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), and instructed employees to take precautions.
Contacted by SecurityWeek, Airbus said it discovered the breach on January 6. A company spokesperson said the “professional personal data” of employees in Europe was accessed, but could not say how many individuals were affected.
Airbus, which has roughly 130,000 employees, specializes in commercial aircraft, helicopters, defense, and space, as well as cybersecurity solutions.
Airbus competitor Boeing was last year hit by what reports claimed was a variant of the WannaCry ransomware, but the company said only a small number of systems were affected and there was no impact on production.
*Updated with information from Airbus
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Eduard Kovacs (@EduardKovacs) is a contributing editor at SecurityWeek. He worked as a high school IT teacher for two years before starting a career in journalism as Softpedia’s security news reporter. Eduard holds a bachelor’s degree in industrial informatics and a master’s degree in computer techniques applied in electrical engineering.
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