Cyberattack against Maine telecom disrupted municipal internet service
At least one municipal government was among those to see their internet service disrupted after a cyberattack against a Maine telecommunications firm Sunday caused an outage affecting 23 towns along the state’s midcoastal region.
A local NBC affiliate reported that the government office of Damariscotta, a tourist town of roughly 2,300 inhabitants, known for its oysters, experienced unreliable or unavailable internet service following a cyberattack against Tidewater Telecom.
“The Town Office currently has spotty to no internet service,” read a public notice issued Monday by the town of Damariscotta, a name reputedly derived from an Algonquian word meaning “place of abundance of small fish.” “Since the majority of town office services rely on the internet, we are significantly limited in what we can accomplish this morning.”
TideWater Telecom posted on its website Monday that the “issue has been identified and a fix is being implemented.” A second post later that day said, “We are working with our internet uplinks to drop the malicious traffic clogging our network. The situation is improving. Please note this is a dynamic situation.” An update Tuesday morning claims “services have returned to near-normal operating conditions.”
NBC reported that no consumer data was affected by the incident.
