© 2025 CoolTechZone - Latest tech news,
product reviews, and analyses.

Former IT employee forces British Museum to partially close its doors


The British Museum in London was forced to partially close its doors last weekend after a former employee tempered with its IT infrastructure.

The employee that was recently fired was able to get back into the building and shut down several systems, including the museum’s ticketing system.

Because the ticketing system was rendered unusable, only a handful of visitors were able to visit paid-for exhibitions, such as the Silks Road show.

In a statement on its website, the British Museum warned visitors for the limited capacity due to the incident. The temporary exhibitions remained closed last weekend.

“An IT contractor who was dismissed last week trespassed into the museum and shut down several of our systems. Police attended and he was arrested at the scene,” a spokesperson of the British Museum told The Guardian.

“We are working hard to get the museum back to being fully operational but with regret our temporary exhibitions have been closed today and will remain so over the weekend, ticket holders have been alerted and refunds offered.”

The police have arrested a man in his 50s on suspicion of burglary and criminal damage. He has since been bailed, but remains a suspect.

The British Museum isn’t the first cultural institution that has been attacked by hackers. In November 2023, the British Library became a victim of Rhysida. They demanded a ransom of 20 bitcoin, which was worth around £600,000 at the time.

Rhysida is a ransomware operation that attacks companies and organizations that haven’t enabled multi-factor authentication and threatens to make sensitive information publicly available.

The gang has been active since May 2023 and has mainly been targeting educational institutions, healthcare organizations, government bodies and the IT sector.


Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked