The City of Johannesburg said on Friday that it has detected a “network breach”, which resulted in unauthorised access to its information systems.

The city said on its Twitter account late on Thursday night that it has shut down various IT systems, including its billing platform, as a precaution.

“Several customer-facing systems — including the city’s website, e-services, billing system (SAP ISU and CRM) — have been shut down as a precautionary measure,” it said.

“The incident is currently being investigated by the City of Joburg cybersecurity experts, who have taken immediate and appropriate actions to reinforce security measures and mitigate any potential impacts.

“The investigation, which is set to take 24 hours, means that customers will not be able to transact on e-services or log queries with the city’s call centre or customer services centres.

“All emergency calls have been diverted to the provincial call centre (112).”

City Power

News of the breach comes exactly three months after City Power, which provides electricity to the City of Johannesburg, said it had been hit by a ransomware virus that had crippled its systems.

The City Power incident crippled the organisation by encrypting its databases, applications and network, it said at the time.