Pompano Beach officials warn nearly 4,000 residents of water bill breach

A data breach at a company that handles the billing for municipal water service has Pompano Beach city officials working to minimize the potential damage.

Hackers gained unauthorized access to credit or debit card data stored with software company CentralSquare and used for one-time online water bill payments made through the city’s website from Aug. 30 to Dec. 6, officials said.

There were 3,790 customers who made one-time payments during that time period.

Officials began investigating the incident after a credit card company notified the city of the possibly fraudulent use of a customer’s credit card.

The city alerted police about the vendor’s breach in security, checked their servers for breaches, and installed a new server to end the threat of more information leaks.

Letters have been mailed to all water customers possibly affected by the breach detailing what steps to take to report and protect against the potential misuse of credit and debit card information.

Pompano Beach’s Information Technologies Department is consistently applying security patches to all city government software, as quickly as these patches are provided, officials said.

The city has the most upto-date virus protection and firewall technology and conducts regular security checks to guard against information theft, officials said.

The city has set up a phone number 954-786-7944 and email address PBTreasury@ copbfl.com for water customers with questions or concerns.