The London Public Library has confirmed it was a cyberattack that took out its systems and shut down multiple branches a week ago.
In the immediate aftermath of the December 13 outage, library officials would only refer to the incident as a "cyber incident". That changed on Wednesday when officials issued a statement with findings of cybersecurity experts who had been called in to investigate.
"The investigation has confirmed that the outage that occurred on December 13 was the result of a cyber attack. At this time, the investigation has not determined whether personal information may be implicated," the statement read.
Library officials have been in contact with London police about the attack.
"It is anticipated that the investigation and restoration to full operations will take more time. The Library will continue to provide more information as it is available," the statement concluded.
The cyberattack knocked out the library's website, online catalogue, computers, public Wi-Fi, digital resources, and ability to allow users to place items on hold. Three of the library's 16 branches were also closed as a result. Those branches - Carson, Lambeth, and Glanworth - are not expected to reopen until January 2.
While the Libby/OverDrive platform for borrowing ebooks and audiobooks have not yet been restored, the London Room Digital Collection, Mango language learning and PebbleGo and Tumblebooks platforms for children were brought back online on Tuesday.
Public computers and Wi-Fi are still not accessible.
Updates and additional information about future restored services will be posted on the library's website www.lpl.ca.
