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Devastating ransomware attack shuts down LA County courts

The Stanley Mosk Superior Court in downtown Los Angeles is photographed on Saturday, March 21, 2020 in Los Angeles, CA. Earlier in the week, California Governor Gavin Newsom issued a "Safer at Home" order to the entire state to help slow the spread of the Coronavirus as it sweeps across the world.  (Kent Nishimura/Los Angeles Times/TNS)
By Summer Lin Los Angeles Times

LOS ANGELES — The Los Angeles County Superior Court, the biggest trial court in the country, remained closed Monday as it sought to recover from a ransomware attack on its systems, officials said.

The attack was detected Friday and doesn’t appear to be related to the CrowdStrike software update that paralyzed Windows computers around the world and affected governments, airlines and other agencies last week, court officials said in a Sunday news release.

This closure extended to all 36 courthouses in the county, and officials did not expect it to last beyond Monday.

“While the Court continues to move swiftly towards a restoration and recovery phase, many critical systems remain offline as of Sunday evening,” presiding Judge Samantha Jessner said in the release. “One additional day will enable the court’s team of experts to focus exclusively on bringing our systems back online so that the Court can resume operations as expeditiously, smoothly and safely as possible.”

The affected court systems span the My Jury Duty Portal and the court’s website, as well as the court’s case management systems, according to the release.

A team of consultants, vendors and law enforcement has been trying to get the systems working again, but some were still inaccessible as of Sunday, officials said.

Court officials didn’t immediately respond Monday to questions about how the attackers got control of the systems and whether the county paid a ransom. They also didn’t respond to questions about what confidential information, if any, was exposed or whether any data was lost.