Japan Airlines (JAL), one of the nation’s largest carriers, became the latest target of a cyberattack early Thursday morning, disrupting its operations and causing delays to both domestic and international flights.
The breach, which began at 7:24 a.m. JST, impacted critical systems linking the airline’s internal networks to external platforms, leading to a suspension of ticket sales and widespread delays.
As of 11:00 a.m., at least 24 domestic flights were delayed by over 30 minutes, the airlines said in an update, with international flights also facing disruptions.
“We identified and addressed the cause of the issue. We are checking the system recovery status. Sales for both domestic and international flights departing today have been suspended,” the airline said in a post on X.
The local media reported that the airline’s app, baggage handling systems, and external communication tools were among the systems affected. The airline temporarily disabled its network router identified as the cause of the disruption.
The carrier emphasized that while operations were affected, the safety of its flights remained uncompromised.
Cyber Threats to Global Aviation
The cyberattack on JAL comes amid growing concerns about vulnerabilities in aviation IT systems. Earlier this week, American Airlines faced a temporary nationwide grounding due to a technical issue.
In July, a catastrophic IT outage disrupted airlines globally, grounding over 10,000 flights and highlighting the industry’s reliance on interconnected digital systems.
Hongkong carrier Cathay Pacific Airways’ data breach in 2018 compromised the personal data of some 9.4 million customers, including credit card information, passport information and phone numbers. The attacks continued until May 2020.
In June this year, Indonesia faced one of its worst cyberattacks that impacted more than 40 government agencies, including the immigration ministry and operations at major airports.
Ganesh Jayaram, chief digital and IT officer at American Airlines, recently emphasized the risk during the Skift Aviation Forum, stating, the thing that keeps him awake at night is the risk of a cyberattack.
Imperva, a cybersecurity firm owned by Thales, had warned travelers of escalating automated threats targeting the travel industry.
According to the Imperva 2024 Bad Bot Report, the travel sector accounted for over 20% of all attack traffic requests monitored globally last year, highlighting its vulnerability to malicious activity.
The report highlights that the travel industry suffered the second-highest volume of account takeover attempts in 2023. Around 11% of all cyberattacks targeted the sector, with 17% of login requests tied to account takeover attempts—an indication of the increasing sophistication and scale of these threats.
Update: In its latest update, Japan Airlines mentioned that the system failure that disrupted airline operations has been identified and resolved. “This issue was caused by a failure due to the transmission of a large amount of data, and there has been no customer data leakage or virus damage,” the airline said in a statement.
The airline added that ticket sales for both domestic and international flights departing on Thursday have resumed. However, standby services at airports for domestic flights scheduled for departure on Thursday would remain suspended.