Huber Heights, Ohio spends months rebuilding after BlackSuit ransomware attack

The city government of Huber Heights, Ohio discovered a ransomware attack on its network on November 12, 2023. The intrusion took multiple municipal systems offline, reaching the zoning, engineering, tax, finance, utilities, human resources and economic development divisions.

Three weeks later the city said it was still working out the extent of the damage. The BlackSuit ransomware group claimed responsibility and said it had released a 129 gigabyte file of city data. City Manager Rick Dzik said the file was being examined by the city's forensic investigator and that officials had not yet established what resident information, if any, it contained. All city services were operating by early December, though some departments were still running on temporary equipment while the network was rebuilt.

The city said it would provide credit monitoring to any resident whose personal information turned out to be exposed. In late January 2024 officials reported that a data mining firm had reviewed 198 gigabytes recovered from the dark web and identified 5,738 residents whose data had been taken, of whom 2,038 were offered monitoring services.

Huber Heights council approved spending of up to $800,000 on network recovery, and the city said the rebuilt network would take roughly three more months. Officials also began recruiting an IT director to lead prevention work. The city did not publicly identify the ransomware group in its own statements.