Jacksonville Beach admits city tech services have been hacked

Jacksonville Beach is now the third municipality in Florida to have had its tech services hacked within the past five years.

It appears Jacksonville Beach is the latest Florida municipality to suffer a cyberattack that hobbled city services.

The coastal community in Duval County shut down many of its city services and closed City Hall after information technology systems for the city of about 25,000 people mysteriously shut down.

“Effective immediately, the City of Jacksonville Beach will shut down due to Information Systems issues,” a statement said on the city’s website.

Now, city officials have confirmed there was a breach of security for the Northeast Florida city’s tech services.

“We recently confirmed the issues are the result of a cybersecurity event. We are working to restore our systems and services as quickly as possible. As our investigation into this matter is ongoing, we are unable to provide further details at this time,” said a statement on the Jacksonville Beach website just after 4 p.m. Tuesday.

This isn’t the first time a Florida city had its municipal services interrupted by aggressive hackers. Two cities sustained cyberattacks within one month in 2019.

Lake City and Riviera Beach both had their services corrupted after aggressive hackers targeted their technological infrastructure five years ago. Both paid more than six figure ransom payments to hackers to get their cyber data returned to them.

Jacksonville Beach officials acknowledged they have contacted law enforcement officials and are conducting an investigation.

The development literally led to most city services coming to a halt in Jacksonville Beach. City Hall, all recreation and parks services and other associated services have been put on hold. Emergency services, waste collection and first responder services remain operational along with Beaches Energy, the electrical service.

Jacksonville Beach officials didn’t estimate when full city services will return.