Ransomware attack on a prison in New Mexico surveillance cameras and access control systems were compromised

Last week's ransomware attack dealt a heavy blow to the Albuquerque regional prison in central New Mexico. Not only did the surveillance cameras become inaccessible, but the automatic access control system was also affected, resulting in prisoners being confined to their cells for long periods of time. Local daily newspapers reported that the first impact was that visitor access was urgently suspended and all Internet services in the prison were shut down, leaving staff unable to view prisoner records.

During technicians' efforts to get the system back online, all inmates in the facility were held captive since the morning of January 5 because surveillance cameras could not meet prison administration needs.

In addition, the emergency notification submitted by the county shows that the database of incident tracking involving fights, force, and sexual assault allegations cannot be used, and it is believed that the database has been damaged by this round of ransomware attacks.

Albuquerque lawyer Taylor Rahn writes:

In the early hours of January 5, 2022, MDC's automatic access control was unavailable, meaning workers had to use keys to manually open facility doors.

But the biggest concern from the cyberattack is that MDC won't be able to access surveillance cameras at the facility and hasn't been able to resume operations as of the evening of January 5.

TheVerge notes that the detention center was just one of the sites of the massive ransomware attack that spilled over into the county on Jan. 5.

In addition, the county government employees had no access to any local database, and all public offices were forced to temporarily suspend operations. It wasn't until Jan. 10 that a press release pointed out that the county office headquarters had been "partially reopened."

Worse still, the accidental detention, affected by the complete collapse of the prison's internal computer network, made it possible that the prison had violated the settlement clauses of the lawsuit regarding the conditions of detention, forcing the county to file an emergency declaration in federal court.