Maryland’s Property Ownership Database Restored After Two-Week Cybersecurity Incident
Maryland’s State Department of Assessments and Taxation (SDAT) restored its property ownership database on Monday, April 29, following a nearly two-week outage caused by a cybersecurity incident. The website, which allows users to search property ownership details, sale histories, and other public records, was taken offline on April 14 after state officials detected suspicious activity on their servers.
Authorities acted swiftly to contain the threat, launching an investigation and temporarily disabling the site to prevent further exposure. Alyssa Nolte, a spokesperson for SDAT, stated that the downtime was necessary to "analyze the affected servers and remediate any issues that could compromise the system again or make it unsafe for public use." After final testing over the weekend, the search tool was deemed secure and reopened to the public.
The Maryland Department of Information Technology confirmed that only publicly accessible property records already available through the website were accessed during the breach. While the state database was offline, residents were directed to county-level real property assessment offices for record requests. No further details on the nature of the incident or potential attackers have been disclosed.
State of Maryland cybersecurity rating report: https://www.rankiteo.com/company/state-of-maryland
"id": "STA1777335883",
"linkid": "state-of-maryland",
"type": "Breach",
"date": "4/2026",
"severity": "25",
"impact": "1",
"explanation": "Attack without any consequences"{'affected_entities': [{'customers_affected': 'Residents of Maryland',
'industry': 'Government',
'location': 'Maryland, USA',
'name': 'Maryland State Department of Assessments and '
'Taxation (SDAT)',
'type': 'Government Agency'}],
'customer_advisories': 'Residents directed to county-level real property '
'assessment offices for record requests',
'data_breach': {'sensitivity_of_data': 'Low (public records)',
'type_of_data_compromised': 'Publicly accessible property '
'records'},
'date_detected': '2024-04-14',
'date_resolved': '2024-04-29',
'description': 'Maryland’s State Department of Assessments and Taxation '
'(SDAT) restored its property ownership database on Monday, '
'April 29, following a nearly two-week outage caused by a '
'cybersecurity incident. The website, which allows users to '
'search property ownership details, sale histories, and other '
'public records, was taken offline on April 14 after state '
'officials detected suspicious activity on their servers.',
'impact': {'data_compromised': 'Publicly accessible property records',
'downtime': 'Nearly two weeks',
'operational_impact': 'Website taken offline, residents directed '
'to county-level offices for record requests',
'systems_affected': 'Property ownership database'},
'investigation_status': 'Ongoing',
'references': [{'source': 'State Department of Assessments and Taxation '
'(SDAT)'}],
'response': {'communication_strategy': 'Public advisories issued, residents '
'directed to county-level offices',
'containment_measures': 'Website taken offline, servers analyzed',
'incident_response_plan_activated': 'Yes',
'recovery_measures': 'Final testing conducted, website reopened',
'remediation_measures': 'Affected servers analyzed and '
'remediated'},
'title': 'Maryland’s Property Ownership Database Cybersecurity Incident',
'type': 'Cybersecurity Incident'}