Riviera Beach To Pay Hackers Nearly $600K In Ransom To Unlock Computers

The Riviera Beach City Council has voted to pay a ransom to the hacker who shut down city computers last month.

The unanimous vote was made during a special meeting of the council this week, to pay more than 60 Bitcoins, which amounts to over a half a million dollars. The city says the money will come from the city's insurance policy, with an $18,000 cost to taxpayers.

The city's interim IT director says an employee "clicked on an email," causing what he called a systemwide cyber intrusion.

The outage forced police and fire to write down 911 calls on paper and residents are having to pay bills in person and don't have access to important documents.

A council member says the system should be up and running in about two weeks. The expected cost to completely fix the issue will be more than $1 million.

Photo: Getty Images


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