HOULTON, Maine — Computers in the town’s police department were infected with a virus last week that essentially shut down access to all documents and programs.
Houlton Police Chief Joe McKenna confirmed Monday afternoon that his department was one of a handful in the state to be impacted by a virus that is commonly referred to as “ransomware.” The Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office and the Boothbay Harbor, Damariscotta, Wiscasset and Waldoboro police departments were also victims.
The virus, which typically enters a computer’s system through an email attachment, encrypts computer files until a ransom is paid. The fee goes up exponentially if it is not paid in the required timeframe. The fee is also based on how much data is seized.
In Houlton’s case, the ransom wound up being about $588 to the hackers. That ransom is paid in “bitcoins” which is a form of online currency that is very difficult to trace. However, when factoring in the costs of tech support to research the problem, McKenna said the actual out of pocket cost to the town is about $1,400.
McKenna said the cyber attack was his fault as he inadvertently opened an email that contained the virus attachment while going through emails in his inbox.
“I have been getting quotes on different pieces of equipment that we are replacing,” McKenna said. “Amongst all those emails was an email with a lady’s name, stating ‘your quote is attached.’ I didn’t think anything about it, so I opened it up.”
McKenna said the attachment was an empty document, so he closed it, figuring the individual must have made a mistake when emailing, and shut off his computer.
That empty attachment was actually a computer virus, which activated once the computer was restarted.
“It locked up all of our computers,” McKenna said. “Everything from emails, to all of our photos and word documents and reports.”
The attack was contained solely to the police department, as the town’s other computer systems were not impacted. McKenna said he first contacted a local computer specialist, who informed him that there was no way to remove it.
“I then called our local Homeland Security office,” McKenna said. “Their computer guy looked at our computers and said, ‘You’re screwed.’”
A third individual from Madawaska was also consulted and he gave the chief the same response that the only way to get those documents back was to pay the ransom.
“There was 10 years worth of critical documents that were locked up,” he said. “We could get limited data, but anything involving shared work was locked up. It pretty much put the department at a standstill.”
McKenna added the department was going to be working with its Internet provider to come up with better protocols to prevent future attacks.
