Subtantial progress in Network Instrusion recovery July 2023
Published on July 28, 2023
DOVER — Almost all Kent County Levy Court systems will be functional within a week following a network intrusion July 8, a news release said Friday.
Substantial progress had been made towards full recovery and “We’re definitely through the hardest part,” Kent County Information Technology Director Joe Simmons said.
“We’re transitioning back to our normal phone systems and we have an increasing number of computers running on a clean, secure network.”
According to Mr. Simmons, the release said, some longer-term project are upcoming.
“We were in the process of updating our website,” he said. “Rather than go back and rebuild the old site, we’re going to push ahead with that project.”
Until the full website is restored, the County will offer an expanded temporary site that will provide a digital payment option for residents, the release said.
In addition to the website project, the County said it is in the middle of a major upgrade to its financial software.
“We’ve been able to pay bills and process payroll,” Finance Director, Susan Durham said in the release.
Ms. Durham added that one of the biggest challenges has been the disruption in internal printing.
“I remember when people said that computers would create the ‘paperless office,’” she said,
“Let’s just say we’re not there yet.”
While Recorder of Deeds Eugenia Thornton described the status of office operations as “optimistic” Wednesday she also said deeds were unable to be recorded.
“We do have two cell phones we can pass around,” she said. “We have laptops so we can use USlandrecords.com to get paper documents ready for recording when the system is up,” she said.
“We can receive emails from our office now.”
According to Ms. Thornton, “Fixing the network problem is a complicated process with many moving parts, all of which must be accomplished and tested before we can record.”
All documents from July 7 and before, Ms. Thornton said, “was backed up on-site before the intrusion. You can access it by going to uslandrecords.com.
“You can also access it by accessing the temporary (Kent County landing page link at co.kent.de.us.)”
Ms. Thornton said that “Everything from July 7 after 3 p.m. is waiting to be downloaded in the order received from the cloud to the Kent servers once they are clean.
“Paper documents are in our office in the order received.”
Ms. Thornton asked that paper documents continue to be uploaded to an e-doc vendor, hand delivered or mailed in to the office.
Four employees in her office record deeds, Ms. Thornton said,
“This incursion has caused or will be causing quite a bit of strain on my staff as it tries to work hard to get through the backlog that currently exists and the higher level of work which will exist once the attorneys are able to resume closing,” she said.
The employees, Ms. Thornton said, “are eager to start recording again. They’re aware of the pressure that’s on everyone to get started again because our real estate community is such an important industry in Delaware.
“Not only does everybody want to own a piece of American dream, of course, but more importantly there’s an entire industry that’s built up around that.
“And that whole industry has ground to a halt.”
Also, Ms. Thornton said Friday said that phone service had been restored. The office can be reached at 302-744-2314.
The Recorder of Deeds said she can be reached 24/7 via email at eugenia.thornton@KentCountyde.gov.
Information is also available on the Kent County Levy Court Facebook page and her personal page as well, Ms. Thornton said.
Officials noted investigation into the intrusion continues and “The unfortunate reality is that these network attacks often originate overseas,” County Administrator Ken Decker said in the release.
“The best we can do is work with law enforcement including cybersecurity specialists to harden our networks and improve security.”
Mr. Decker said earlier that Delaware State Police and the Federal Bureau of Investigation were investigating.
According to Mr. Decker, the County expects to be back to “business as usual” in the coming week.
Property tax bills are scheduled to be mailed on time, and the property tax reassessment process will to continue, according to the County.
As noted before, the network intrusion did not cause any disruption of critical County services like the 911 Dispatch Center, Emergency Medical Services, or wastewater treatment.
County officials are tracking expenses but have not projected the total cost of the recovery, the release said.
“We carry cyberinsurance,” Ms. Durham said. “We’ve also had an incredible amount of support from other jurisdictions including the City of Milford, New Castle County, Sussex County, and Caroline County, Maryland, and they are not charging us anything.”
Mr. Simmons added that the County expects to receive a $100,000 cybersecurity grant to cover some of the costs of upgraded network equipment.