Wash. Fire District Website Hacked; FBI Notified

The website for East County Fire & Rescue was hacked over the weekend, Interim Chief Al Gillespie said.

An employee logged onto the website on Saturday morning and noticed that users clicking on a portion of the page were redirected to content he described as “inappropriate,” Gillespie said.

The fire chief was in the office for a seminar at the time and was informed of the incident right away. He reported the crime to the Clark County Sheriff’s Office and to the FBI and said that he hopes to learn who was behind the act.

Their website, www.ecfr.us, appeared to be down Monday.

“If the general public went on there to find out information on their fire department, they’d end up at this inappropriate stuff,” Gillespie said. “We don’t want this to happen again.”

Sgt. Fred Neiman, spokesman for the sheriff’s office, said deputies looked into the compromised website, but that there were no suspects so far.

“There’s nothing more to investigate, we’ve gone as far as we can take it,” Neiman said. “If someone comes forward with information, we’ll certainly investigate that.”

FBI spokeswoman Ayn Dietrich said the bureau is aware of the incident and working with local agencies as they investigate.

“Frequently, digital crimes can be difficult to attribute to a particular subject but, with time, additional reports of incidents provide enough small clues to stitch together into a larger picture,” she wrote in an email.

Anyone with information about the incident is asked to call the sheriff’s office at 360-397-6179.

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