‘Cyber incident’ shuts down Cleveland Municipal Court for third straight day

Cleveland Municipal Court is closed for the third straight day this week due to a cybersecurity incident. 

The court has posted the same statement about the event to its Facebook page every day since Monday, saying they “have not confirmed its nature and scope” and that “all internal systems and software platforms will be shut down until further notice.”

“As a precautionary measure, the Court has shut down the affected systems while we focus on securing and restoring services safely,” they said. “These systems will remain offline until we have a better understanding of the situation.”

A spokesperson for the municipal court did not respond to a request for comment. 

Cyberattacks have disrupted the operations of municipal governments in the U.S. at a steady clip and put pressure on already strapped budgets.

Some municipal offices in Maryland’s Anne Arundel County were shuttered on Monday after a cyberattack over the weekend. The county said that even after reopening offices on Tuesday, it was still taking “precautionary measures to ensure the safety of our systems and will continue to update the public as more information becomes available.” 

On January 11, the Qilin ransomware group claimed an attack on the Connecticut city of West Haven that forced it to shut down its IT systems. 

The city of Columbus, Ohio was also the victim of a ransomware attack last July, resulting in exposure of information of more than 500,000 current and former residents.