Palouse, Washington, restores city website after cyberattack

Palouse, Washington, restored its city website after a cyberattack, but some recently added content was lost and had to be re-entered, officials said.

The disruption involved a public-facing municipal website that carries city information, payment links, alerts and contact information. Palouse is a small Whitman County city in eastern Washington with about 1,000 residents, according to census-linked population data.

The Whitman County Gazette reported Thursday that city officials said the website had been restored after a cyberattack and that no sensitive data was compromised.

City Administrator Misty La Follett told council members during the Tuesday, April 14, meeting that the site was recovered using a backup from the city’s hosting provider, the Gazette reported. April 14 meeting minutes were not posted on the city website as of Friday.

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Officials have not publicly said when the cyberattack began, how long the website was unavailable, what systems were affected beyond the website or whether law enforcement was notified. The public reporting did not identify a threat actor, ransom demand or ransomware involvement.

The incident adds to a recent run of cyber disruptions in Whitman County. Whitman County government reported a cyberattack in 2021, and Whitman Hospital and Medical Clinics in Colfax reported downed computer systems after a 2025 attack that caused appointment delays and complications.

The Palouse website has been restored, but the cause, method of access, full outage duration and whether any third-party systems were affected remain unclear.

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