PHOENIX — Some Arizonans who depend on child support or unemployment assistance recently had to wait longer to receive their benefits after the vendor who sends out the state's checks fell victim to a cyberattack.
About 800 checks processed by the Arizona Department of Economic Security were late in getting to their recipients after Exela Technologies experienced a cyberattack, according to the Arizona Department of Administration.
The delayed checks were printed on Sunday and began to be sent out on Tuesday.
State officials say the departments of Revenue, Child Safety, and the Health Care Cost Containment System were also affected by the outage. About 15,000 refund checks issued by the Revenue Department were affected and have recently begun to be mailed out.
"No state systems were compromised," ADOA said in a statement, "and the Arizona Department of Homeland Security worked to ensure all state systems were protected during the outage."
Exela is currently working with the state to resolve the backlog and get back to normal operations, ADOA said.
Arizona contracts with Exela to mail out correspondence and paper checks.
Up to Speed
Catch up on the latest news and stories on our 12 News YouTube playlist here.
More ways to get 12 News
On your phone:
Download the 12 News app for the latest local breaking news straight to your phone.
On your streaming device:
Download 12 News+ to your streaming device
The free 12 News+ app from 12 News lets users stream live events — including daily newscasts like "Today in AZ" and "12 News" and our daily lifestyle program, "Arizona Midday"—on Roku and Amazon Fire TV.
12 News+ showcases live video throughout the day for breaking news, local news, weather and even an occasional moment of Zen showcasing breathtaking sights from across Arizona.
