Cleveland remains paralyzed by cyberattack

Cleveland City Hall remains shut down for residents as officials work to contain and eradicate a cyber incident that has disrupted the city's systems for six days.

Residents have been unable to access birth certificates, death certificates, building permits and other services.

Cleveland resident Eneida Vazquez was angry she was unable to obtain her baby daughter's birth certificate at city hall Thursday morning.

"It's really an inconvenience," she said.

Due to a family emergency, she will travel to Puerto Rico tomorrow.

Vazquez said she must bring her 14-month-old daughter with her and needs the baby's birth certificate to board the plane.

"I can't leave her," she said. "She's breastfed. So she needs mom."

City workers sent her to Lakewood, where she was able to get the documents.

Akron's experience

The City of Akron experienced a similar cyber attack in 2019

Chief Technology Manager Darren Rozenek said it took eight to ten days to restore the city's systems because they had to remove and repair problems and put safeguards in place.

He also said cyber attacks targeting municipalities are becoming more common.

"We do everything we can to protect our environment, our data, our people. We put everything in place to do it, but cyber events are more of a matter of when not necessarily if," he said.

He said the "bad actors" who attacked Akron's systems stole financial data and then sold the information. They have yet to be caught.

He sympathized with Cleveland and said a cyber attack is "traumatic" for the city employees who work to keep the systems safe.

According to Cleveland officials, The Department of Information Technology Services (ITS) has managed to contain the threat and is actively working to restore full functionality to city systems and services.

City Hall reopened Wednesday but encountered challenges with technological systems that left residents frustrated by the inconvenience.

There was no word from Cleveland officials Thursday evening regarding when City Hall will reopen.