Lately, we have observed a sudden rise in cyber attacks against cities and towns around the world including the US, the latest victim of which is the city of Pensacola.
The city’s Mayor Grover Robinson has acknowledged that an extensive cyber attack on Friday crippled several City services in Pensacola, Florida including city phones, emails, 311 customer helpline, online payment services, Pensacola Sanitation services, and Pensacola Energy.
See: A city in Texas is using paper after suffering ransomware attack
City officials are not sure if the incident has any connection with the Pensacola Naval Air Station shooting that also happened on Friday. However, they did confirm that 911 and other emergency services weren’t affected by the cyber attack.
According to the Mayor’s spokesperson, it is “too early” to confirm or deny anything as the incident is still being assessed by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, Department of Homeland Security, and the FBI.
The City of Pensacola has notified the FBI of a potential cyber related incident. We are providing resources to assist. No additional information is available at this time.
— FBI Jacksonville (@FBIJacksonville) December 9, 2019
“We understand that it’s on people’s mind but we just don’t know at this point,” stated Lagarde.
Reportedly, the incident was noticed on Saturday, at around 1:30 a.m. It is yet unclear what sort of cyber attack affected the city services, how many computers were targeted, and whether the attackers have demanded ransom or not. It is worth noting that lately, ransomware and DDoS attacks have been crippling cyberinfrastructures worldwide.
See: Man whose DDoS attacks took down entire country’s Internet jailed
As for the cyber attack on the city of Pensacola, since critical systems were also impacted in the incident, investigators are trying to find out if any data was exposed at all. A majority of the affected systems are still offline as a preventive measure. At the moment the IT department employees of the city are busy restoring the network.
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