One password, 700 jobs lost: How a ransomware attack crushed a 158-year-old UK firm

It took just one weak password for cybercriminals to bring down KNP, a 158-year-old transport company based in Northamptonshire—leaving 700 people without jobs and a legacy in ruins.

KNP, which operated a fleet of 500 lorries under the Knights of Old brand, is one of tens of thousands of UK businesses hit by ransomware gangs. Even retail giants like M&S, Harrods, and Co-op have been recent targets. Co-op’s CEO confirmed that data from all 6.5 million members had been stolen in a recent attack.

In KNP’s case, the breach likely began with hackers guessing a single employee’s password. That opened the door to a full-scale digital siege. The attackers, identified as the notorious Akira ransomware group, encrypted the company’s systems, locking staff out of critical data. The only way out? Pay a ransom that experts estimated could be as high as £5 million—a sum KNP couldn’t afford.


"If you're reading this it means the internal infrastructure of your company is fully or partially dead…Let's keep all the tears and resentment to ourselves and try to build a constructive dialogue," read the ransom note.

Despite industry-compliant IT systems and cyber insurance, KNP had no way to recover its data. The company collapsed under the weight of the attack. Director Paul Abbott, visibly shaken, says he never told the employee whose password may have triggered the disaster.

The UK has been the victim of many high-profile ransomware attacks in recent years, from the "WannaCry" cyber attack that crippled Britain's National Health Service in 2017 to the British Library suffering disruption when it refused to pay a ransom in 2023.

Ransomware, which is malicious software used by criminals to access victims' computer systems, encrypt data, or steal information and hold it hostage until a ransom is paid, is estimated to cost the economy millions of pounds each year.