UT: Ransomware attack hits Garfield County, shutting off its computer access for weeks

Ben Winslow reports:

A ransomware attack hit Garfield County’s computer systems, crippling them for weeks before they were able to pay to get access to their own data, officials confirmed to FOX 13.

“All of our data had been taken,” Garfield County Attorney Barry Huntington said of the recent data breach.

Someone clicked on a phishing email earlier this year that launched a ransomware attack, swiping up a number of county offices’ data and locking it away.

“The Assessor’s Office, the Recorder’s Office, some of the files had been taken and we didn’t know how or why,” Huntington said Thursday. “Eventually we received an email stating that some terrorists had taken our information and if we wanted it back, we had to pay them.”