Kansas City officials and law enforcement have still not provided details about why the city government website remains offline, keeping courts closed and preventing residents from accessing some municipal services.
The outage began over the weekend. For several days, residents have not been able to use Kansas City’s 311 action center, to report issues like potholes, problems with rental housing, illegal dumping and health code violations.
The city clerk’s website, which lists the meeting times and agendas for Kansas City Council, is also down. All city council meetings were canceled Tuesday, and Municipal Court has been closed since the start of the week.
“Out of an abundance of caution, the City of Kansas City temporarily shut off some access to the network and some systems while we continue to investigate and ensure there are no issues,” said city spokesperson Sherae Honeycutt in a statement. “Users may experience intermittent outages and we appreciate everyone’s patience.”
Honeycutt said that Municipal Court will reopen Wednesday, May 8. However, it will not be able to post bonds or accept payments.
Our IT department is addressing a computer system outage. The majority of city services have been restored:
— Kansas City (@KansasCity) May 8, 2024
⚖️Municipal Court is open.
The myKCMO app is now accepting tickets.
Water bills may be paid in-person.
Community Centers are open.
Thank you for your patience. pic.twitter.com/HKFGTF787b
Residents who want to submit a complaint to 311 can still do so over the phone by calling 816-513-1313. Tickets can also be submitted through the myKCMO app.
KC Water was also impacted, causing frustration for customers. Although the website is still up, the utility’s phone and online payment systems are unavailable due to “technical difficulties.” Customers with urgent water or sewage issues are directed to contact KC Water’s customer service line for assistance.
Honeycutt said that Kansas City will provide a grace period for anyone having difficulty making payments through affected systems.
Until the online payment system is restored, KC Water customers can pay their bill in person, with cash or check, at the Water Services Department at 4800 E. 63rd Street from Monday-Friday, 9 a.m.-4 p.m.
The city's permitting website is offline as well.
Kansas City isn't alone in its website troubles. A cyberattack took down the Wichita city website over the weekend.
Wichita officials on Monday said the website was targeted by an encryption malware, although it would not disclose who was responsible “for operational security purposes.”
Several Kansas City residents reached out to KCUR’s texting service regarding the lack of city services. One resident complained about being unable to report trash dumping, while another resident said they could not pay their water bill.
Jackson County recently experienced a ransomware attack that shut down its tax payment, online property, marriage license and inmate search systems.
County officials say that incident stemmed from a phishing scam carried out by a Russian hacker group. The attack caused some county departments to close for several days, affecting tax payments, marriage licenses and other services.
Last month, a cyberattack caused outages in the KC Scout traffic management system, affecting its cameras, website and message boards. Those services are still offline.
“Work on service restoration is underway,” the service posted on social media last week. “It is too early to provide an estimate, but it is expected to be months before restoration can be anticipated.”
The Kansas City Area Transportation Authority and the Kansas state court system were also hit with cyberattacks in recent months.
The Kansas Office of Judicial Administration said in a statement on Monday that about 150,000 people were impacted by the cybersecurity incident, which included personal information like Social Security numbers, payment card information or driver's license numbers.
This story used information sourced through KCUR's texting services. Learn more and sign up here.
