New ticket machines from Northern Rail have been hit by a suspected ransomware attack.

The system has been offline since last week while an investigation takes place.

The cyber-attack comes eight weeks after 621 brand new touch-screen machines were deployed across 420 Northern stations, costing £17 million.

“This is the subject of an ongoing investigation with our supplier, but indications are that the ticket machine service has been subject to a ransomware cyber-attack,” said Northern Rail.

The company website has alerted customers to “technical difficulties” which have forced the self-service ticket machines offline.

It advises travellers to instead use their mobile app or website to purchase tickets in advance and collect tickets from the ticket office where possible.

A spokesperson form Flowbird, which supplied the machines, said: "We immediately instigated our major incident procedure in order to protect other parts of the network and our checks have shown there has been no compromise to any personal data.”

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