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"description": "Officials say the affected systems appear to have held only public information as the investigation continues and no restoration date has been announced.",
"path": "/maryland-property-search-outage/",
"publishedAt": "2026-04-20T15:26:47.000Z",
"site": "https://dysruptionhub.com",
"tags": [
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"Nevada",
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"textContent": "Maryland’s Real Property Search system remained offline Monday after state technology officials detected suspicious activity on servers running the public records site and shut it down for investigation. The official site continued to display an emergency maintenance notice Monday.\n\nThe Maryland Department of Information Technology, or DoIT, said it detected suspicious activity April 14 on servers running the State Department of Assessments and Taxation’s, or SDAT’s, Real Property Search application. The state took the site offline to contain potential threats and said it will remain unavailable until it is cleared for public use.\n\nScreenshot of a Facebook post from the Maryland State Department of Assessments and Taxation announcing that the Real Property Search tool is temporarily unavailable.\n\nThe outage affects a tool used by residents, businesses and real estate professionals to look up property records. SDAT says the service provides ownership, value and sales information for roughly 2.5 million real property accounts statewide.\n\nState officials have not described the incident as a cyberattack, disclosed its nature or identified any suspected responsible party. In its April 18 advisory, DoIT said early analysis suggested the affected systems contained only public information already available through the web application and that it did not anticipate a broader cybersecurity risk to the state at this time. No public claims of responsibility had emerged as of publication, and the agency did not respond to an emailed request for comment.\n\n****Chip in once****\nIf this reporting helped you, a one-time tip helps cover hosting, tools and future investigations.\n\nTip us\n\n****Support us monthly****\nA small monthly pledge keeps independent coverage and our reader tools online for everyone.\n\nBecome a Supporter\n\nThe state warned users not to rely on third-party sites or unofficial links claiming to provide SDAT property records while the tool is down. People needing records are being directed to local Real Property Assessment offices or SDAT’s contact center while the outage continues. No public restoration timeline has been announced.\n\nState government technology interruptions have affected a range of public-facing systems over the past two years, including a Nevada network security incident that disrupted websites and phone lines, a statewide outage in Washington court systems, and a Georgia court records portal disruption that forced some counties onto paper processes.\n\nSDAT, based in Baltimore, is Maryland’s tax and assessment agency and says it handles real property valuation, business records and tax-related information for state and local jurisdictions.\n\nOfficials said the investigation is ongoing. Key unanswered questions include what triggered the shutdown, whether any systems beyond the public-facing property search were affected, and when the site will return.\n\n****Attribution note:**** DysruptionHub credits upstream reporting and primary sources—see citations above. If this report informed your coverage, please cite DysruptionHub with a link.",
"title": "Maryland property search remains offline after suspicious activity",
"updatedAt": "2026-04-20T15:26:48.607Z"
}