Barclays has moved to reassure customers that the systems failure it was hit by this afternoon was not the work of hackers.
Asked if it had identified the cause of the problems, which left users unable to withdraw cash or use their debit cards, a spokesman said: “Not at this stage.
“That will come out once they do the review.
“But it’s a technical issue – it’s not a cyber attack.”
The bank reported at about 7.40pm that the problem had been fixed, saying its customer services “are now recovering from a technical issue we experienced this afternoon”.
It apologised for the inconvenience caused.
The bank does not yet know whether the debit card failure, which was first reported at lunchtime, was linked to an earlier technical collapse that grounded its internet and mobile banking services.
“The systems are up and running,” said the spokesman, “but we are closely monitoring them to ensure their stability.
“Effectively, customers can now do their transactions as they so wish.”
