The town of Midland has confirmed it is dealing with a cyber-attack.
Hackers illegally accessed the town’s network on Saturday morning and infected it with a virus which was able to encrypt a number of systems. They are now demanding a ransom to decrypt the systems which have been rendered unusable.
This comes just months after Wasaga Beach paid a ransom to hackers after their data was compromised.
The release on Tuesday says the town of Midland’s staff worked quickly to isolate the attack and that “all necessary steps are being taken to restore access to systems, and files to ensure operations return to normal as quickly as possible.”
Officials say they learned from the Wasaga Beach incident.
“At the time of the attack the Town was in the process of making several improvements to our IT security,” added Town of Midland Chief Administrative Officer John Skorobohacz, “Once systems are fully restored, we will continue with those plans and look for additional opportunities to enhance our security based on the guidance of cyber-security experts.”
The town says vital services, like fire and waste management, were not impacted and there is no evidence that any information was removed or accessed.
