An ongoing “service interruption” at government contractor Conduent has caused power outages in several U.S. states, leaving residents without access to some benefits and assistance.
A person familiar with the incident told TechCrunch that the outage was caused by a cyberattack. Conduent spokesman Sean Collins acknowledged the company's ongoing outage, but declined to answer questions or deny the possibility of a cyber incident.
“While we have restored service over the past few days, we are currently experiencing service interruptions impacting some applications. Conduent's technical team is working hard to resolve any remaining issues. ,” a Conduent spokesperson said.
The Wisconsin Department of Children and Families told residents in a social media post on Jan. 17 that it was unable to process child support payments across the state for most of the week. The department said four states, including Wisconsin, were affected by the Conduent power outage. Ministry spokeswoman Gina Page said service was restored on January 19, but declined to comment to Conduent on the cause of the outage.
Oklahoma Human Services, which administers the state's food assistance program, told residents in a social media post on Jan. 9 that Conduent's customer service line had experienced a “technical outage.” Spokesperson Casey White told TechCrunch that the state's systems are “operating as expected” and “we have not experienced any outages related to Conduent's security.”
In June 2020, Conduent confirmed a ransomware attack days after reporting a service disruption. The Maze ransomware gang took responsibility for the breach and subsequently released various documents stolen from the company's systems.
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