The city of Wichita warned its residents on Tuesday that the gang behind a recent ransomware attack likely stole sensitive law enforcement information.
In a data breach notice about the incident, which is still affecting numerous city services, the government said hackers copied files from its network between May 3-4.
Wichita officials said there is still no timetable for when affected systems will be brought back online.
Since the incident, police officers have had to keep paper records and all city offices have had to revert to cash payments in lieu of access to credit card systems.
All local transit services are fare-free until further notice and the public wifi at the airport as well as several libraries is shut off for the time being.
The LockBit ransomware gang recently took credit for the incident and yesterday claimed to have sold the data to an undisclosed buyer.
The LockBit ransomware operation has been hobbled by a law enforcement operation against its infrastructure earlier this year.
The group has continued to launch attacks but last week its alleged leader was outed by international law enforcement agencies.
Callow noted that several other ransomware groups have previously claimed to sell data in an effort to save face and make future victims believe their data may indeed be sold if a ransom is not paid.
Several other counties and cities across the U.S. have reported attacks recently limiting government services.
The city of St. Helena, California, published a notice yesterday warning that its IT team is working with the FBI and the U.S. Secret Service to resolve a cyberattack that began on Monday.
All of the city's servers and computers are offline and officials were not able to access their emails as of Wednesday.
Police, emergency services and water systems were not affected by the attack.
The city's IT team told the Press-Democrat that the servers accessed by the hackers held mostly staff reports and public records but warned that some of the documents may have personal data.
The St. Helena attack occurred the day after the government of Macon-Bibb County in Georgia faced similar issues.
For days, the county has had to keep systems offline to deal with a cyberattack.
In an update on Tuesday, the county said phone service across the government has been restored but email and internet access is still offline - leaving residents out of luck with basic services like reservations, court payments, taxes and more.
Much of the county website is still inaccessible as of Wednesday.
According to Callow, at least 40 local governments in the U.S. have dealt with ransomware attacks this year.
Before moving back to New York City, he worked for news outlets in South Africa, Jordan and Cambodia.
This Cyber News was published on therecord.media. Publication date: Wed, 15 May 2024 21:40:15 +0000