Riviera Beach’s computer system running slowly as it recovers from cyber attack
RIVIERA BEACH, Fla. — A Rivera Beach council member says the city's computer system continues to face a slow recovery after it
fell victim to a costly cyber attack in May.
On Monday, a sign on the front door of City Hall read:
"Please be advised that the City's computer system is currently down. The City apologizes for any inconvenience this may cause."
However, a spokesperson for Riviera Beach said the system is not down and is running.
WPTV got clarification from Councilwoman KeShamba Miller-Anderson. She said there's still a slow recovery in place. Data is being recovered, but parts of the system are slower to recover than others.
"Nothing is being stopped at this time," said Councilwoman Miller-Anderson. "We're able to continue to service our customers."
The councilwoman said the outage sign was likely up because the city is still working on getting operations back to their normal level.
"The sign was probably up in case people came and there was a little delay," said Councilwoman Miller-Anderson.
Last month, Riviera Beach city leaders
agreed to pay a ransom
to get the city's computer system back online after a
cyber intrusion took it down
when "someone clicked on an email," according to a city spokesperson.
Council members authorized the city’s insurance carrier to pay a 65 Bitcoin ransom, which equates to about $600,000, to recover the city’s data.
RELATED:
Ransom payment could make Riviera Beach a bigger hacking target
The ransom payment came just weeks after
Riviera Beach agreed to spend almost $1 million
to fix and replace compromised computer equipment.
Law enforcement is investigating the May cyber attack.
On Monday, Councilwoman Miller-Anderson said Riviera Beach is speaking with other cities that have also fallen victim to cyber attacks and were forced to do data recoveries.
"From my understanding, everything is moving in a positive direction," said Councilwoman Miller-Anderson. "I haven't heard of any issues we're up against."
Gloss