The UK government has confirmed that it suffered a cyber attack back in October, but avoided confirming rumors that Chinese hackers were behind the incident.
Speaking with Times Radio, British Trade Department minister Chris Bryant confirmed the cyber attack, following reports by The Sun that said that Chinese hackers had breached UK government systems to access data from the Foreign Office.
"There certainly has been a hack," said Bryant.
According to The Sun, the threat actor allegedly behind the incident is Storm-1849, a Chinese-state linked hacking group. The publication said that the group targeted government servers in October, leading to them accessing the visa details of potentially tens of thousands of people.
Storm-1849 is known for targeting government networks as part of a campaign called ArcaneDoor, according to threat researchers.
Bryant was unable to confirm that the group was behind the incident, adding that the report was purely “speculation” and that an investigation into the incident was ongoing.
"I'm not able to say whether it is directly related to Chinese operatives, or indeed, the Chinese state,” said Bryant.
Speaking with Sky News, Bryant said that the vulnerability had been patched.
“We managed to close the hole, as it were, very quickly," he said.
"It was a technical issue in one of our sites."
The hack follows a number of major UK businesses being hacked throughout 2025, including Jaguar Land Rover (JLR), Marks & Spencer (M&S), Co-op and Harrods.
The cyber attack on JLR put such a strain on British manufacturing, that the UK government granted the car manufacturer a £1.5 billion safety loan to keep it afloat as it dealt with the fallout of its cyber attack.
“The car manufacturer, owned by Tata Motors in India, revealed that it had suffered a cyber attack at the beginning of September, announcing that it had shut down its systems to prevent further damage.
“JLR has been impacted by a cyber incident. We took immediate action to mitigate its impact by proactively shutting down our systems,” Jaguar Land Rover said in an undated statement on its corporate website.
