Foster City declares emergency after cyberattack forces city computer system offline for days

FOSTER CITY, Calif. (KGO) — With a unanimous vote, the Foster City City Council adopted a resolution Monday night saying their town was in the middle of an emergency following a ransomware attack last week.

Officials say they took most of their computer systems offline last week as a precaution after discovering suspicious activity on their network.

Days later, the issue is still ongoing and public services remain limited.

Once the meeting was over, ABC7 Eyewitness News went up to the Foster City mayor to ask him to speak with us. The mayor said the city had no comment at this time.

MORE: City of Hayward declares local emergency after ransomware attack

Other officials told us the city would speak out after the incident was resolved.

A stance that frustrated some residents like Yiming Luo.

“We don’t know what got affected, what departments are affected, how it affects us,” said Luo.

Luo tells us he booked a pickleball court on a city website for Tuesday and wants to know if his credit card information has possibly been compromised by the cyberattack.

He’s calling for the city to be more transparent.

“Do they have cyber insurance? Or are we taxpayers through the general fund, are we going to front all the costs to rebuild all the servers?” said Luo.

Although he has questions, Luo says he thinks those in charge are trying their best.

And he’s hoping they’ll soon be able to provide a timeline for him and other locals.

“I hate to criticize them if they’re not giving us updates, like passing judgment super fast. It has only been a couple of days. But it would be nice to get updates on it,” said Luo.

Foster City officials say they’re working with independent cybersecurity specialists to help them with their investigation.