After Fulton County, Georgia, suffered a cyberattack and subsequent power outage at the end of January, leading to malfunctions in court filings, tax processing, and the court system website, there are concerns of the future of Fulton County court cases and its overall system.
Criminal defense attorney Joshua Schiffer noted that his job is becoming more strenuous now that dispositions are being held, causing a backlog in cases.
It’s still unclear if the attack was ransomware or some other disruptive action that’s making data access impossible.
“We can’t do our jobs. Neither can the courts … when we slow down a system as large as ours, the effects just reverberate through the rest of the system,” he said.
And it’s not just attorneys or public officials that are struggling.
“Clients are terrified and scared,” Schiffer said, adding that plaintiffs and defendants alike are having difficulty finding information and looking up cases online. “The criminal justice system is already deeply intimidating, and now they’re being told by everyone [that] it’s a little bit more broken and slower than normal.”
Fulton County Commission Chairman Robb Pitts said that the county is working to restore services but it’s unknown when the court filing system will be restored to full function.
