Oaklandside reportsthere have been four legal claims and a class action lawsuit filed against the city, with the prospect for more coming from city employees, residents or others whose confidential information was targeted in the cyber attack, which began on February 8th.
Among those who have filed suit is an Oakland police services technician, who alleges that cyber criminals were able to breach the city’s “inadequately protected information network.”Hackers allegedly affiliated with the ransomware criminal organization known as PLAY, cut off access to files and databases for several city departments.
The cyber criminals also managed to steal several years worth of confidential data, including social security numbers and dates of birth of city employees and residents, as well as highly sensitive information on discipline and internal investigations from the Oakland Police Department.
To press its extortion demands, the hackers dumped large amounts of the stolen data online.
The city notified about 13,000 people impacted by the breach. As of late April, the city reported that its IT systems had been restored. But the city has declined to comment further on the ransomware attack or the pending litigation – despite subsequent data dumps by the hackers.
