New York State's Ethics Panel Confirms Cyberattack on Filing System

The state of New York's ethics panel announced Friday that some of its systems are offline following a "deliberate malicious cyberattack."

The Joint Commission on Public Ethics said IT officials took the webserver that houses its Lobbying Application and Financial Disclosure Statement Online Filing System and other systems down earlier in the week after being alerted of suspicious activity. The cyberattack was confirmed after several days of forensic analysis, officials said in a statement.

It's unclear who was behind the attack and JCOPE said it doesn't know if there was an actual breach of user and agency information. The incident is still under further investigation.

“Our first and highest priority is the safety and integrity of the data entrusted to the Commission by the regulated community,” JCOPE Executive Director Sanford Berland said. “We are working with our partners in information technology and law enforcement to identify the scope of the attack, to ensure that the incident response is comprehensive, and to bring each system back online as soon as safely possible.”