Travelex Says UK Money Transfer and Wire Services Back Online After Hack

Travelex's UK international money transfer service and wire offering is fully operational again, it said on Tuesday, almost a month after a crippling ransomware attack forced staff to use pen and paper to calculate foreign currency exchanges.

The cyber-attack forced the company to take all its systems offline, causing chaos for New Year holidaymakers and business travellers seeking online currency services.

It is more than a week since the company, owned by Finablr, said that the first of its customer-facing systems in Britain was up and running again and a phased global restoration of systems "firmly underway".

Despite saying at the time that an automated order placement service used by a number of its British retail banking partners was already live, travel money websites at Tesco Bank, Barclays, HSBC and Virgin Money -- all Travelex customers -- were still offline when checked by Reuters on Tuesday.

Finablr said last week that the Travelex cyber incident would not impact 2019's results, nor was it expected to have a material impact on the company's performance in the current year.

Travelex, which was hit by ransomware called Sodinokibi, has not said if it paid any money to the hackers. British media reports, including from the BBC which said it had spoken with the hackers, have pegged the ransom demand at $6 million (roughly Rs. 43 crores).

However, Travelex's losses will be at least partly covered by a cyber insurance policy arranged by broker Gallagher, three insurance industry sources told Reuters.

Gallagher declined to comment, while Travelex did not respond to a request for comment.

© Thomson Reuters 2020