COLD LAKE - The City of Cold Lake is currently facing a potential cybersecurity incident that has disrupted phones, payment systems, and emails across all city facilities, including City Hall, the Energy Centre, FCSS, Public Works, the marina, the golf course, and the transfer station.
Despite these challenges, all facilities remain open but are operating with limited services.
On Tuesday, Kevin Nagoya, CAO for the City of Cold Lake, provided an update on the situation, saying, "We're really early in the game right now, but I can confirm that we have had a cyberattack overnight. It actually happened about 5 a.m. this morning, so our systems are down in order to pick up it happened very quickly for us to be able to react to it."
Nagoya explained that the City has taken down its servers to isolate and protect all computers, and they will assess any potential impacts throughout the day.
“Right now, there is no kind of evidence that there's any data breaches of sensitive information because there are different mainframes and different separate systems within the city that we don't keep all together anyways for these reasons,” Nagoya further explained.
Nagoya assures residents that the City has back-up information stored off-site at a bank, providing redundancy and security. However, he noted that rebuilding data might be necessary, especially for certain software systems like Microsoft, which sometimes require reconstruction after such incidents.
"I think we have to look at the extent yet. We're still at the very early stages... I think it's too early for me to give timelines on when we'll be fully back up and running. That being said, in order to do alternative service delivery when it comes to the systems, the staff are ready to continue to provide services to the city.”
Each site has alternative methods for manual invoicing to ensure continued operations, for example. Services such as waste management, the Energy Centre, and City Hall will remain open, accepting development permits and other services. Although some manual entries will be required, these will be followed up later to ensure residents receive uninterrupted services.
Efforts are underway to restore phone services.
"Probably right now if you phone the main phone numbers of the city, it just kind of has gibberish if you try to call them. That connection will be to new cell phones within the city so that people still can phone the same phone numbers, and those should be up within a few hours."
Nagoya speculated on the motives behind the attack, suggesting it could be to destroy or lock down information using encryption ransomware, but emphasized the City's quick response.
"Things are locked down, and we are looking at the systems from off-site locations to be able to access the systems, just to see what their integrity is and what data is trying to be accessed right now.”
For now, the incident is isolated to Cold Lake.
“So far, it's just the City of Cold Lake that is being impacted by this. No other municipalities have come out and said that this has happened to them so far.”
In conclusion, Nagoya emphasized the City's commitment to maintaining services, noting their robust staff training and security testing. He assures residents that emergency services and community safety are not compromised.
“The staff are working through it hard and full on. We’ll be bringing in additional resources if necessary for IT support and we’ll go from there.”
He also assured that essential services, including waste management, public works, and City Hall operations, will continue, even if it means reverting to manual processes.
“We’ll be issuing statements both throughout the day and probably throughout the week as we learn more about the system.”
