Breach of data still impacting county offices

Some computers brought online as company addresses problem

Offices at the St. Francis County Courthouse are continuing to deal with the effects of a data breach that occurred at the headquarters of the county’s IT vendor over two weeks ago.

The county’s vendor, Apprentice Information Systems Inc., based in Rogers, notified SFC Assessor Craig Jones on Nov. 5 that the system had been compromised and advised Jones to turn off the county’s server that Saturday evening.

The breach affected about 73 of the state’s 75 counties, making it impossible for work to be done on the computer systems since that time.

Initially, Jones said the breach was expected to take about two weeks to address.

Although things are improving somewhat locally, many of the county’s offices only have a couple of computers up and running, while some have none, particularly the collector’s office where delinquent taxes are paid.

County officials are working around the delinquent tax problem when it comes to people getting tags for their vehicles, allowing them to get the tags without having to pay the taxes that are currently delinquent, although that amount will have to be paid when the resident attempts to get tags next year.

Jones said his office currently has two computers up and running and employees are working to input information gathered on paper documents while the system has been down.

“We are really trying to get caught up on all of the information we collected on paper and put that into our computers,” said Jones. “They (AIS) had to come in and scrub the computers, delete what was on the desktops and go from there. After that process has been completed, they cut it back on at Rogers and then they send a message to us to turn the computers back on.”

Jones said his computers were turned back on Friday along with those in the county clerk’s office.

“Apprentice had people physically come down here last week. They stayed several hours Wednesday night and came back on Thursday. On Friday, they called and said to start it back up. Our server is also back on,” said Jones.

The collector’s office has not yet received the green light to turn its computers back on and right now that office is unable to process any information regarding taxes or accept payments on delinquent taxes.

“We’re looking for them any day to say that one is ready to start back up,” said Jones of the collector’s office. “It’s looking better but we’re still dealing with problems.Once the collector gets on, we can actually function again.”

SFC Deputy Collector Sandra McMillion said even though she is at the office, the collector’s office remains closed to the public until the computer system is back up and running.

“There is nothing we can do at this point. We’re waiting on

Apprentice to come in and get us back up and we’re hoping that’s done tomorrow or Wednesday,” said McMillion. “We really have no idea when it’s coming back up.”

SFC Clerk Brandi McCoy said two of the computers in her office are back online but not all of the software is working properly.

“Some of our programs, like the marriage license program and some other things are still not working, but we can do checks now,” said McCoy.

Last week, McCoy processed the county’s payroll by writing 145 payroll checks by hand. She said today and tomorrow she plans to process the county’s bills and bonus checks for employees.

SFC Treasurer Tammy Talley said she had been on the telephone this morning dealing with the breach and that her office is now back up and running.

Neither the circuit clerk’s nor the county judge’s office were impacted by the breach.