Columbus City Attorney Zach Klein has filed a restraining order against the man who has provided numerous details on the extent of the massive data breach hampering Columbus city government.
A filing on the Franklin County Common Pleas Court docket website shows that the city on Thursday filed a motion for a temporary restraining order against David L. Ross Jr., aka “Connor Goodwolf,” the computer consultant who has single-handedly shown Mayor Andrew Ginther’s statements to be incorrect about the extent of damage done when a foreign cybercrime organization hacked the city’s server farm in July.
“They’re trying to find a fall guy for their incompetence, which is not going to happen,” Ross told The Dispatch Thursday afternoon. “I’m getting in touch with the ACLU, getting a lawyer,” and the end of this is going to be “lawsuit after lawsuit against the city.”
“I’m going to be lawyering up and I’m going to go from there,” joining police and firefighters who are suing the city for their data being stolen, putting finances at risk, said Ross, who added that the city’s breach consultant tried to hire him earlier – which he was suspicious may had been an attempt to stop him from speaking publicly about the extent of the hack.
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The order asks Franklin County Common Pleas Judge Andria C. Noble to order Ross “from accessing,and/or downloading, and/or disseminating” any stolen files – something that apparently anyone in the world can do, and likely many – including criminals – have.
Ross said it accuses him of causing “unrest” in the city, accessing a law enforcement system, and privacy violations, “which is not the case – I’m investigating the breach.”
In fact, Ross’ investigation has proven many more details that the city have divulged, even prompting Ginther to correct himself about the extent of the damage. Far from disputing anything Ross has found on the “dark web,” the city has seemed to back up his findings – even to the point of approving free credit-monitoring services and identify-theft insurance for every city residents hours after Ginther proclaimed publicly that the data stolen was encrypted, and therefore useless.
“This is going to end up with a ‘color of law’ lawsuit, infringing on my First Amendment rights,” Ross said.
wbush@gannett.com
@ReporterBush