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Jaguar Land Rover is working with cybersecurity specialists and the police following a targeted cyber hack which has shut down production until at least Tuesday.

The British brand has been rebuilding its internal IT systems since they were breached on Monday, which also caused dealer sales, handovers and parts ordering to stop.

Autocar understands dealers are now manually registering cars while the systems remain down. Meanwhile, the majority of workers at JLR’s production sites in the West Mldlands and Merseyside have been told not to return to work until 9 September.

JLR told Autocar in a statement on Saturday that “our retail partners remain open”, adding: “We continue to work around the clock to restart our global applications in a controlled and safe manner following the recent cyber incident. We are working with third-party cybersecurity specialists and alongside law enforcement.

JLR hack: what happened?

On Monday, hackers claimed to have exploited a flaw in the British car maker’s IT system.

In an effort to combat the hack, JLR said it began “shutting down our systems” on Tuesday and is still in the process of rebuilding them. JLR was unable to confirm a timescale for the fix.

Autocar understands that this caused production to stop at the Halewood technology site as well as the Solihull plant, where the Range Rover and Range Rover Sport are built. JLR wouldn’t comment on the claims.

The Liverpool Echo reported that a notice sent to Halewood workers on 4 September told staff to stay away, with a plan to "attend work as normal on Tuesday September 9 unless informed otherwise".

The issues are also affecting dealers, who are unable to order parts, can't code parts they do have to cars, and are unable – in some instances – to complete customer handovers.

In addition, they are having to manually register vehicles. This involves phoning the DVLA in each instance.

Autocar first reported the issues affecting JLR on 1 September, when dealers couldn't register new cars on 'new plate day' , traditionally one of the year's busiest for registrations.

JLR's public-facing website appears to be fully operational, including the car configurator.

Who has claimed responsibility?

On 3 September, Scattered Spider – the group that hacked Marks & Spencer in May, causing seven weeks of disruption and costing £300 million in lost operating profit – claimed responsibility for the attack on JLR.

Along with fellow hacking group Shiny Hunters, it claims to have obtained customer data after exploiting a similar flaw in JLR’s IT system, The Telegraph reports.

The claim was made on a Telegram messenger group, where a user linked to the hackers posted a screenshot of what appeared to show JLR's internal system.

A member of the group told The Telegraph that a well-known flaw in SAP Netweaver - third-party software used by JLR - was exploited to access the data.

US cyber agency CISA warned about the flaw earlier this year. An update for the software was released, but whether JLR applied it is unknown.

It's also not known what data was taken or if a ransom demand has been made. 

JLR told Autocar in a statement on 3 September that “there is no evidence any customer data has been stolen”.

​According to The Telegraph, the hacking groups are believed to be made up of teenagers from English-speaking countries.