Mississippi State Auditor Shad White speaking at the Neshoba County Fair. (AP Photo/Rogelio V. Solis, File)
- State Senator Nicole Boyd told Magnolia Tribune that she has confirmed that no taxpayer money has been used to pay ransoms in either of the two recent cyberattacks.
In response to two recent cyberattacks on the state’s higher education networks, the State Auditor’s office is requesting information on whether taxpayer money was used to pay any ransoms associated with the hacks.
The notice was sent to Dr. Al Rankins, Commissioner of the Mississippi Institutions of Higher Learning, on Monday by State Auditor Shad White (R).
The letter comes after two cyberattacks on the networks this year.
Back in February, the University of Mississippi Medical Center suffered a network breach that caused systems to go down, leading to clinic closures. Medical care within the hospitals and emergency rooms was able to continue during the down time. UMMC is part of the University of Mississippi, which is under the IHL.
Most recently, the IHL office confirmed it was affected by a cyberattack on September 7, but notice was not sent to individual institutions until September 10. The IHL stated that institutions were not notified immediately because the “breach was confined to the IHL office and was not a system-wide incident.” The Office of Financial Aid, which was impacted, is located within the IHL office.
The State Auditor’s office is now requesting the IHL provide more information on both attacks, such as the actual date of the breaches, the dates when the Mississippi Department of Information Technology Services was notified, details on the scope of the attack, if a ransom was paid, and if so, the source of funding used to pay the ransom, and the plans to address the cybersecurity deficiencies.
“Taxpayers deserve to know what happens to their money and the IHL should be transparent with what happened here,” White stated in the letter.
When contacted for comment, State Senator Nicole Boyd (R) told Magnolia Tribune that she has confirmed that no taxpayer money has been used to pay ransoms in either of the two recent attacks.
“There was no ransom paid using any state tax dollars or anything like that,” Boyd said Tuesday.
White has requested the information be presented to his office within 14 days. His letter is shown below.
