A UK water company with around 1.6million customers has been targeted in a criminal cyber attack.
It comes amid hosepipe bans across parts of the country due to droughts caused by the ongoing scorching temperatures.
South Staffordshire PLC, the parent company of South Staffs Water and Cambridge Water, has tonight reassured customers the incident has not affected water supplies.
In a statement, it said it has “robust systems and controls” in place to quickly implement emergency measures for such a scenario.
It went on to say it was still, however, “experiencing disruption” to its corporate IT network but teams were “working to resolve this as quickly as possible”.
The statement added: “It is important to stress that our customer service teams are operating as usual.
“We are working closely with the relevant government and regulatory authorities and will keep them, as well as our customers, updated as our investigations continue.”
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It comes after Thames Water moved to deny reports it had itself been targeted by hacker group Clop ransomware.
The rogue group claimed on Monday it had gained access to 5TB of data and could change the chemical composition of the company’s water supply.
A spokesman said such reports were false.
“We are aware of reports in the media that Thames Water is facing a cyber attack. This is not the case," they said.
"As providers of critical national infrastructure we take the security of our networks and systems very seriously and are focussed on protecting them, so that we can continue to provide resilient services to our customers and the environment.”
The UK saw temperatures soaring across the country last week and droughts were declared in eight areas in England.
Much of the UK has seen the driest July since 1935 and many reservoirs have been badly affected.
The hot weather is now coming to an end as the Met Office have issued yellow weather warnings for thunderstorms and heavy rain across the UK this week.
But despite the end to the dry weather, this isn't expected to be enough to replenish the country's low water supplies.
Hosepipe bans have already come into effect in some areas of the country, and more will be imposed in the coming days and weeks.
