Two teenagers have been arrested in the UK in connection to the cyber-attack on a nursery chain in London.

The two 17-year-old boys were arrested at the same address in Hertfordshire, under suspicion of violations of the Computer Misuse Act and blackmail.

The hack stole the names, addresses, and photographs of about 8,000 children from the Kido nursery chain.

The Met Police were notified of the cyber-attack by the Action Fraud cyber-crime reporting service on 25 September.

The hackers initially approached the BBC on 22 September attempting to get press attention to support their extortion attempts against the nursery. While the BBC did not report on the issue at the time, it says the hackers, which called themselves Radiant, sought £600,000 worth of Bitcoin in their ransomware attempt.

Hackers began to post images and profiles of some of the children affected in the hack on their darknet site on 25 September, leading to outrage and mass media coverage.

The hackers went so far as to call parents directly in order to coerce Kido into paying the ransom to ensure the sensitive data would be deleted as Radiant continued to share children’s profiles on the darknet.

However, the hackers then began to blur images it had published as the group was reportedly concerned with how it would be viewed by other ransomware gangs for the targeting of children.

In another unusual move, the hackers removed all the stolen data and pictures from their darknet site on October 2, posting: “No more remains and this can comfort parents.”

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“We understand reports of this nature can cause considerable concern, especially to those parents and carers who may be worried about the impact of such an incident on them and their families,” head of economic and cybercrime at the Met, Will Lyne, said.

“These arrests are a significant step forward in our investigation, but our work continues, alongside our partners, to ensure those responsible are brought to justice.”

Among the breached information included the details of parents and carers who work for the nursey chain.

“We welcome this swift action from the Met Police and recognise this is an important milestone in the process of bringing those responsible to justice,” a spokesperson for Kido said

“We have cooperated throughout this process with law enforcement and the relevant authorities. We remain committed to supporting police and, importantly, families, colleagues, and the wider Kido community.”