The final installment in The Dallas Express’ May edition of Crime Boss of the Month cannot be researched or published due to admitted issues with the City of Dallas’ computer systems.
As previously reported by The Dallas Express, the City claimed it was targeted in a ransomware attack that disrupted several online services and data servers, including those that provided the public with readily accessible crime statistics.
The Dallas Express regularly uses the City of Dallas Open Data crime analytics dashboard to get the most up-to-date information on the state of public safety in the city. While the purported cyberattack allegedly hindered the City’s ability to publish crime data, historical figures were still available from before May 2.
Beginning on Tuesday morning, however, the dashboard could not be accessed at all. As of Wednesday evening, this was still the case.
The Dallas Express contacted the City and inquired why the dashboard was down. Ashley Guevara, a public affairs officer for the City, responded in an email:
“This is unrelated to the ransomware incident, and our team is working diligently to resolve this as quickly as possible.”
The Dallas Express asked if there was any additional information the City could provide and whether a contingency plan was in place to provide the public with crime data, but no reply was received before press time.
As previously reported by The Dallas Express, a significant plurality of Dallas voters feel that the City needs to be more transparent about its operations, likely in part due to its sordid history of misconduct by City leaders.
The Dallas Express, The People’s Paper, believes that important information about the city, such as crime rates and trends, should be easily accessible to you. Dallas has more crime per capita than hotspots like Chicago, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, and New York, according to data from the FBI’s UCR database.
Curious to know how your area stacked up on crime? Normally, you could check out our interactive Crime Map to compare all Dallas City Council Districts, but as reliable data remain unavailable, this feature remains blank. Those interested in how we got our numbers previous to the ransomware hurdles can check out our methodology page here.