The City of Pensacola is Currently Experiencing a Cyber-Attack

The city of Pensacola, Florida, is experiencing a cyberattack and has disconnected several city services until the issue can be resolved.

“The city of Pensacola is experiencing a cyberattack that began this weekend that is impacting our city network, including phones and email at City Hall and some of our other buildings,” Pensacola Mayor Grover Robinson said at his weekly press conference on Monday morning.

Robinson declined to comment on whether the hackers asked for a ransom. The city is getting help from outside cybersecurity experts to evaluate the situation and help get the systems working again, he said.

The 311-customer service is able to receive calls but responding to requests may not be immediately possible, reads a statement from the City of Pensacola. “We severed things immediately as soon as we found out we were having this problem,” said Pensacola Mayor Grover Robinson in a press conference today, reports the Pensacola News Journal.

Two Florida cities paid out large ransoms earlier this year in response to cyberattacks. Lake City paid out $426,000 worth of bitcoin, and Riviera Beach paid out $600,000 to hackers.

“State and local governments have been particularly visible targets for ransomware attacks,” but health care organizations, companies and transportation agencies have been hit as well, the FBI said in October.

Reference:

https://www.cnn.com/2019/12/09/us/pensacola-cyber-attack/index.html