Most aviation processes are heavily digitized, and in the wake of new cyber threats, airlines and the broader sector must prioritize cybersecurity more than ever before.
There has been an alarming surge in cyberattacks against airlines, airports, and air traffic management systems. Global data reveals that cyberattacks rose by 131% between 2022 and 2023 across the aviation industry, with a 74 percent increase since 2020, underscoring the profundity of this threat. In the first half of 2023 alone, aviation cyberattacks surged by 24% worldwide, fueling disruptions from flight-planning systems to passenger services.
These incidents pose a serious threat to business continuity. The financial and reputational stakes are enormous: failures in cybersecurity can lead to grounded flights, passenger data compromise, and revenue losses amounting to billions of dollars annually. With the aviation sector contributing $1.9 trillion in total economic activity and supporting 11 million U.S. jobs, the repercussions of a major breach extend far beyond the tarmac.
As airlines upgrade for connected sky-travel and regulators tighten their grip with new rules, the stakes for cybersecurity have never been higher.
The aviation ecosystem is an intricate web of airlines, airports, air navigation service providers, maintenance suppliers, and third-party technology vendors. A cyberattack on any link, be it a ground-handling contractor or a software provider, can trigger cascading failures. Much of the industry still relies on legacy operational tech (OT) systems that lack modern security features such as automated patch management and encryption by default. These aging systems often run on outdated operating platforms incompatible with newer protocols, leaving wide attack surfaces unprotected.
Critical services are frequently outsourced in the aviation industry, which further expands vulnerabilities. When vendors gain network access for ticketing, baggage handling, or route planning, they can inadvertently introduce malware or provide a foothold for threat actors. Additionally, a distributed workforce, ranging from remote maintenance technicians to cabin crews, multiplies entry points for social-engineering tactics like phishing.
Aircraft themselves are nodes on data networks, constantly transmitting telemetry, engine performance metrics, and passenger connectivity data. The onboard router that serves crew and passengers has been identified as one of the top cyber vulnerabilities, particularly if administrators neglect routine password changes and firmware updates.
The attack vectors are diverse: fraudulent websites mimicking airline booking portals, phishing campaigns targeting airline staff, distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks crippling airport websites malware infiltrating maintenance system, ransomware encrypting critical backend databases, and more. Ransomware is especially prevalent, with 55% of civil aviation cyber decision-makers admitting to being victims in the past 12 months.
Cybersecurity breaches have affected every corner of aviation. This is hardly an exhaustive list of every cyber incident, but here are just a few of the more high-profile cases.
In 2018, Cathay Pacific suffered what remains one of the most serious data breaches in airline history, compromising the personal information of up to 9.4 million passengers—including passport details, birth dates, frequent-flier numbers, phone numbers, and credit card information.
In 2021, SITA, a major IT provider for Star Alliance and OneWorld members, was breached, exposing the data of over 2 million frequent-flyer accounts across multiple global carriers.
Airports have also been targeted. An orchestrated DDoS campaign by the pro-Russia group Killnet in 2022 rendered the public websites of more than a dozen U.S. airports, including LAX, ATL, and ORD, offline for hours, disrupting traveler information systems.
In July 2024, Delta Air Lines experienced a catastrophic IT outage when a faulty software update from cybersecurity vendor CrowdStrike crashed approximately 8.5 million Microsoft Windows computers globally. The ripple effects forced Delta to cancel over 7,000 flights and delay 35,500 more, affecting 1.3 million passengers and prompting a $500 million lawsuit against CrowdStrike.
Supply-chain players have not been spared. The Rhysida ransomware gang breached the Port of Seattle’s legacy systems in August 2024, crippling ticketing, check-in kiosks, and passenger display boards at Seattle–Tacoma International Airport. The port later stated 90,000 people were impacted after attackers accessed employee, contractor, and parking data.
Boeing itself was targeted by the LockBit ransomware platform in 2023, facing a $200 million ransom demand, while its unit Jeppesen, a provider of flight navigation tools, suffered a major ransomware incident in 2022, delaying flight-planning services and illustrating the cascading risk of a single provider outage.
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Regulators worldwide are tightening standards. The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has proposed new rules to protect airplanes, engines, and propellers from Intentional Unauthorized Electronic Interactions (IUEI), requiring manufacturers to identify threat conditions, analyze vulnerabilities, and implement multilayered defenses.
Since 2009, the FAA has issued "special conditions" for cybersecurity, but the upcoming rulemaking aims to standardize criteria, reducing certification complexity and expediting approvals for secure new products.
Beyond hardware, the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) unveiled an ambitious plan to build a "brand new" air traffic control (ATC) system by 2028, following a radar communications blackout at Newark Liberty International Airport in April 2025 that exposed aging infrastructure weaknesses.
The modernization includes replacing antiquated copper wiring with fiber, wireless, and satellite links at more than 4,600 sites; deploying 25,000 new radios and 475 voice switches by 2027; swapping out 618 radars from the 1970s and 1980s; and constructing six new ATC centers for the first time since the 1960s.
The Notice to Airmen (NOTAM) system is an essential system; it provides alerts to pilots and other aviation professionals to temporary changes or potential hazards along a flight route or at an airport. This is being upgraded to provide near-real-time data exchange. It's due to be hosted securely in the cloud under a contract with CGI Federal, Inc., and slated for completion by September 2025.
International bodies are collaborating too: IATA (International Air Transport Association) is developing shared cyber risk requirements, and the EU's aviation risk management framework takes effect in 2026.
Aviation organizations should be now preparing for stricter rules by strengthening their cybersecurity posture. Comprehensive risk assessments across information and operational technology (OT) systems lay the groundwork for targeted defenses. Employee training is paramount as staff awareness can thwart phishing and social-engineering attempts before any significant damage occurs. Advanced technologies such as AI-driven threat detection and endpoint protection are needed to offer 24/7 monitoring of anomalies in flight planning or supply chain data streams.
Aviation supply chain mapping reveals the direct and indirect partners needed to enable security audits and contractual mandates for consistent cybersecurity standards. This needs to be coupled with layered perimeter defenses (encryption, firewalls, intrusion detection systems) combined with zero-trust network segmentation to reduce the risk of lateral movement by attackers. Blockchain shows promise for securing ground-to-air and ground-to-ground data transactions, while AI can filter and prioritize critical NOTAM alerts to controllers.
There's a major need for cloud security, and airlines are turning to platforms that continuously scan for misconfigurations, enforce least-privilege access, and automate remediation workflows. Carriers are integrating end-to-end encryption, automated compliance auditing, and real-time anomaly detection into their cloud deployments to dramatically reduce the risk of data breaches.
The cyber incidents in aviation demonstrate how a single failure in an interconnected ecosystem can ground entire sectors overnight. Industries such as healthcare, energy, and manufacturing share this vulnerability: aging operational systems lacking modern security, sprawling third-party supply chains, and a human workforce susceptible to phishing or misconfiguration errors.
The reputational fallout from high-profile breaches—whether billions in flight cancellations or stolen passenger data splashed across headlines—underscores that no industry is immune from public and regulatory scrutiny when cybersecurity fails. The aviation sector's ongoing push to replace decades-old analog infrastructure with fiber networks and cloud-native platforms highlights the peril of delaying critical updates.
Other industries can learn concrete lessons from aviation's journey toward cyber resilience. First, embedding Security-by-Design and comprehensive evidence management from day one builds stronger defenses and smoother compliance pathways than retrofitting protections later.
Second, rigorous supply chain mapping and contractual cyber hygiene mandates, as aviation has adopted with its navigation tool and maintenance vendors, help prevent third-party outages from cascading across operations.
Third, investment in frequent, scenario-driven drills and well-documented incident-response plans ensures that teams can respond swiftly and cohesively when any disruptions occur.
Finally, cross-sector collaboration, mirroring IATA's shared-risk frameworks, enables collective defense against emerging threats, reminding every industry that cybersecurity is a communal, not siloed, endeavor.
While aviation remains one of the safest modes of travel, the digital storm gathering over the skies demands urgent attention. Vulnerabilities in outdated OT systems, interconnected supply chains, and sprawling operational networks have fueled a surge in cyberattacks, posing grave risks to safety, data integrity, and business continuity.
There's a massive need for integrating advanced technologies, rigorous assessments, supply chain vigilance, and a culture of security awareness; it's the only way the aviation industry can navigate new cyberthreats. In doing so, this not only protects the flying public but also offers a blueprint for other industries charting a course through their own digital transformations.