Wichita County officials problem statement on substantial-scale “disruption in personal computer network”

Update: KFDX News been given this assertion at 12:58 p.m. from Wichita County Judge Jim Johnson regarding the outage of the county laptop or computer system:

“Wichita County recently uncovered a disruption in our personal computer community. We have taken prompt motion to protected the community, and we are operating with primary independent cybersecurity industry experts to assist with our response and the restoration procedure. We are presently investigating the circumstance and doing the job diligently to decide the scope of the incident.
Please take note that we are fully commited to enjoyable all lawful notification obligations and will present updates as they grow to be out there. Our potential to answer to your messages may well be delayed and we value your tolerance as we get the job done via this.”

WICHITA FALLS (KFDX/KJTL) — The Wichita County network has been down for many days, top lots of to question if the community is suffering from an outage, or if it has been compromised in a a lot more nefarious way.

The community, which includes the Wichita County Courthouse, the Wichita County Sheriff’s Place of work, and public access to county records and court docket documents, has been out of commission given that early in the week.

Though county officials have confirmed the community is not at present in operation, none have confirmed much else on the subject, triggering concerned citizens to speculate no matter if the county has been the goal of a cyber assault of some form.

According to a prime-elected Wichita County official, the network is “dead in the h2o.” An staff with Wichita County reported the payroll technique is down, hindering personnel from distributing their hours.

Our newsroom has created various tries to get hold of Wichita County officials for much more info, but all endeavours have, as a result significantly, been unsuccessful.

Wichita County Choose Jim Johnson is now out of the workplace at a meeting. Our newsroom spoke to Van Dotson, his Chief of Staff members, who reported all he is aware of is the community is down and they are functioning on it. He instructed our newsroom to get hold of the county’s Information and facts Technologies Division for much more details.

When our newsroom attained out to the IT department Thursday early morning, an personnel claimed a message would be offered for a callback. As of the publication of this story, that phone has not been returned.

When our crews attempted to go to the IT division in individual on Thursday morning, they had been not allowed within for footage.

Our newsroom has achieved out to many other division heads within Wichita County, such as District Clerk Leslee Mannon and Tax Assessor-Collector Tommy Smyth, but we have not obtained a reaction as of the publication of this tale.

When our crew went to the Treasurer’s Workplace late Thursday early morning, it was locked with a handwritten take note on the door stating, “Out to discover a performing computer… Again soon.”

A county official informed our newsroom off the file that the outage is staying investigated by regulation enforcement companies, but that declare has not been officially verified.

Various county systems in Texas have been hacked and ransom payments have been demanded in latest decades, which include Tarrant County as not too long ago as March 2024.