News Release
Muscatine Power and Water (MPW) is updating customers that it continues to navigate the impact of a ransomware incident identified Friday evening, January 26, affecting its corporate IT infrastructure network. While internet services were impacted that night, MPW’s team quickly mobilized and positioned new equipment to restore internet services within 8 hours. MPW’s utility business systems impacted Friday evening were also restored that same weekend, enabling MPW to conduct normal business in time for their 8 am Monday opening of business. Additionally, at no time were critical controls systems at the power plant or in the field at risk. The Utility wants to thank the community for their patience and understanding while their systems were fully recovered.
Since identifying the issue, MPW has taken steps to contain the incident and have engaged an independent cybersecurity firm to assist in an investigation to determine the nature and scope of the occurrence. The forensic investigation is ongoing and their IT staff, in partnership with independent experts, are working diligently to shed light on this situation to better guard against future events. MPW also notified state and federal law enforcement and regulatory agencies. The support from all these resources has been invaluable.
MPW wants customers to rest assured that their investigation does not show that their internet customers were targeted or that their home/business systems were compromised.
At this time, the forensic investigation has revealed that some current and former customer data, such as address, social security number, driver’s license, etc. may have been potentially exposed in this incident. MPW is working diligently to identify those impacted individuals and will provide complimentary credit and identity theft monitoring, along with access to a toll-free call center to answer any questions customers may have. Notification letters containing the nature of potentially impacted data, instructions on how to set-up the complimentary credit and identity theft monitoring, and the toll-free number to the call center will be mailed over the coming weeks to all impacted individuals.
While these types of situations have become all-too-common nationwide, MPW recognizes the significance of this event. They realize this situation is frustrating, and they hope to earn back customers’ trust. MPW is taking an in-depth look at improving what they do, how they do it, and doing better moving forward.
MPW knows that it can be frustrating not to hear more specific details at this time, but they wanted to get this notice out now so that customers heard it from them directly. The Utility operates with transparency and candor, and believes it is important that customers get this notice as soon as possible, even if the details are still being worked through.
Like its customers, most MPW employees are members of this community and customers of the utility. They take great pride in serving their neighbors, friends, and family members in this community and are all working very hard to remediate this situation in the best way possible.
MPW has provided all the details they can at this time. The letter from MPW will provide more details specific to each customer personally, so please watch for that. This matter is beyond the scope of what MPW Customer Service and HelpDesk teams can assist with, however, if a customer wants to voice anything related to this matter, please feel free to contact MPW directly at mpw@mpw.org. In the meantime, MPW appreciates your continued patience and support.
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