Today at 11:19 AM
The city of Mitchell has been hacked, according to an email from a Davison County official
Davison County staff received a directive to “not open any emails from anyone with the city of Mitchell!” The Mitchell Republic obtained the email Friday morning acting on a tip from a reader
“The city of Mitchell’s service has been hacked,” Christine Norwick, deputy Davison County auditor, wrote in an email to county staff
Norwick told county employees that TechSolutions advised county employees to not open anything that comes from the city of Mitchell even if county employees were expecting the email
Mitchell Mayor Jordan Hanson on Friday morning would not answer specific questions from the Mitchell Republic but issued this response:
“The City of Mitchell is currently investigating a potential cybersecurity incident impacting a limited portion of its network environment. Please note that all critical and emergency services are unaffected and remain fully operational. We immediately shut down the environment as a precaution and are currently working with a team of forensic experts to fully understand the extent and implications of this incident and to restore operations within a safe and remediated network environment. At this time, we have no indication that our email environment has been affected.
While these types of situations have become all-too-common nationwide, we recognize the significance of this event and have quickly taken the appropriate steps to address it. Understanding this, the City of Mitchell has systems in place to mitigate such events
Nothing is more important to us now than allowing our systems to operate seamlessly again, and please be assured that we are sparing no effort to continue to allow us to provide the highest service to the City of Mitchell community. We are committed to providing further updates as they are available to us.”
When reached by phone on Friday afternoon, TechSolutions IT Operations Manager Jordan Thuringer told the Mitchell Republic he was not aware of any security breaches at Davison County offices related to the city of Mitchell breach
Two federal agencies have recently warned state and local governments across the U.S. that cyberattacks are increasingly likely, and that such attacks are likely to originate in Iran, China or Russia, according to an investigative report by South Dakota News Watch
Early last month, Pennington County had a cybersecurity incident,
which affected parts of the county’s computer network. The breach affected computer-based communications, internet access and providing record keeping and registration services. Cybersecurity breaches typically come from foreign powers or crime syndicates, according to reporting by South Dakota News Watch
Elements of the cyberattack point to an adversarial foreign government as the responsible party, said John Strand, owner of Black Hills Information Security, a Sturgis-based company that is an industry leader in cybersecurity
Strand told News Watch in an interview that cyberattacks on American government entities typically originate from one of two victims or international adversaries that either seek intelligence on U.S. networks and systems or intend to disrupt daily life in America
A page on Dakota State University’s website is dedicated to assisting with local governments to improve cybersecurity of their technology. “The DSU MadLabs is part of the
Madison Cyber Labs
within the Research and Economic Development department on the DSU Madison campus,” the website says
The group is funded in part through legislative action from 2024 that makes “an appropriation to establish a cybersecurity services initiative for counties and municipalities and to declare an emergency.”
It was immediately unclear on Friday whether the city of Mitchell utilizes these services. It was also unknown whether information from residents was at risk
By
Staff reports
Our newsroom occasionally reports stories under a byline of “staff.” Often, the “staff” byline is used when rewriting basic news briefs that originate from official sources, such as a city press release about a road closure, and which require little or no reporting. At times, this byline is used when a news story includes numerous authors or when the story is formed by aggregating previously reported news from various sources. If outside sources are used, it is noted within the story.
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