Sector hit by cyber-security incident

A number of UK cultural organisations, including museums, are having to deal with the fallout from a cyber-security incident at Beacon, a technology firm that provides customer relationship management (CRM) systems to charities.

Beacon notified those affected by the issue on 3 August, forcing many organisations to send emails alerting customers to the problem.

Museums impacted include the Foundling Museum, London; Sheffield's National Videogame Museum; and York Museums Trust. The Paul Mellon Centre; UP Projects; and the English National Ballet are among the arts organisations affected.

A Beacon spokesperson said: “We recently experienced a cyber-security incident that involved unauthorised access to Beacon systems containing data we process on behalf of our customers. We immediately engaged external cyber-security experts to help us contain the incident and investigate.

“We understand this is concerning and we’re taking it very seriously. We’ve already spoken with all our customers and our focus now is on supporting them as much as possible in any onward communication of their own regarding potential data impact.

“Beyond our immediate containment actions, Beacon hasn't experienced any service interruption as a result of this incident and our customers continue to access our platform and services as normal,” the statement concluded.

The Beacon website says that more than 1,000 charities use its services.

The incident at Beacon follows a number of recent cyber attacks on UK cultural institutions,

The most high profile of these was the British Library, which is still dealing with the fallout from a cyber-attack in 2023.

The National Museum of the Royal Navy was hit by a cyber attack in December 2024.