Cyber incident at the British Library and impact on services at The University of Manchester Library
Due to ongoing issues following the cyber incident at the British Library at the end of 2023, several of their online resources are currently unavailable.
The situation at the British Library has had an impact on some of our services at The University of Manchester Library as well as the availability of certain resources.
At present, electronic theses from the British Library鈥檚 EThOS service which are usually discoverable and accessible via Library Search are unavailable. There are, however, a number of other options for accessing theses and dissertations online via the Library. University of Manchester theses from 2010 onwards which are Open Access are available to view via the and a huge range of theses and dissertations from UK and international institutions are available electronically from 鈥� please see our and dedicated for further information and details of other sources for digitised theses. We also hold print versions of a selection of pre-2010 University of Manchester theses in the Library and these are available to request as reference only items.
In addition to EThOS, the following databases are currently unavailable until further notice: and .
The British Library鈥檚 services for digitisations and Inter-Library Loans have also been affected. Fortunately, The University of Manchester Library has been able to continue fulfilling requests by utilising alternative avenues and via interim solutions provided by the British Library, but turnaround times have been impacted in some cases. University teaching staff should continue to make digitisation requests as normal via the , however please be aware that requests may take longer than usual to fulfil.
In December 2023, the British Library initiated a phased recovery which is anticipated to take place over an 18 month period and will involve workarounds and interim solutions for certain areas 鈥� hopefully we will see the full return of more services in the near future.
For further information on the impact of the cyber incident, please see the dedicated .