Firefighter Response Times Slowed After Cyber Attack

A crippling cyber attack on Victoria’s professional fire service slowed efforts to reach time-critical blazes but it insists no lives or property were lost in the fallout. Fire Rescue Victoria (FRV) fell victim to a cyber attack in December 2022, with the hack exposing sensitive information and impacting its IT and communication systems. A briefing note prepared for Emergency Services Minister Jaclyn Symes, provided to the opposition under freedom of information laws, reveals its automatic station turn-out system was not restored until August 2023. Crews were instead dispatched through manual processes such as pagers, mobile phones, and radios, increasing the time it took firefighters to leave their stations....