Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) has told its factory workers to stay at home as the luxury carmaker deals with the aftermath of a major cyber attack. Production, which was paused last week, is now

expected to remain halted at least until Wednesday, with employees asked to stay on standby while the company sorts things out.

The shutdown affects multiple sites, including the Halewood plant in Merseyside, the Solihull factory in the West Midlands, and the engine plant in Wolverhampton. Initially, workers were told not to return until September 9, but the disruption has forced the company to extend the pause by at least another week.

JLR detected the cyber attack on August 31, which hit systems across its global operations. The company says it’s “working around the clock” to get production back up and running, bringing in cybersecurity experts and putting temporary workarounds in place to keep some activity going.

While JLR hasn’t confirmed exactly who might be affected, it has said that “some data” may have been accessed. Anyone whose information is involved will be contacted directly.

Business minister Sir Chris Bryant said he couldn’t confirm whether the attack was state-sponsored and cautioned against jumping to conclusions. Meanwhile, an English-speaking hacker going by the name “Rey” has claimed responsibility for the breach.

This attack comes amid a wave of cyber incidents targeting UK companies. Retailers including M&S, the Co-op, and Harrods have all been hit recently. For example, M&S had to halt online sales for around six weeks and warned that the attack could cost the company roughly £300 million. Even train operator LNER reported that hackers accessed some passengers’ contact details and travel information earlier this week. Photo by Sonia Dines (Wikipedia Takes Coventry participant), Wikimedia commons.