JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- JEA officials describe the cyber attack that shut down the website and pay-by-phone system as a massive cyber traffic jam.
For more than 48 hours, many JEA customers had no other choice but to make their payments by mail or in person.
While electric, water, and sewer services were not disconnected during this time, the attack created a huge nuisance for the utility company.
Now they're implementing safeguards to prevent this from happening again.
"We have hired a third-party consultant. We're just adding another layer of security to our system," said Gerri Boyce, JEA spokeswoman.
The FBI and local law enforcement are still trying to determine the origin of the attack known as the "denial of service."
Action News did some digging and found that JEA fights potential hackers on a daily basis.
According to the director of networking systems and security at the University of North Florida, these attacks have been around for years.
"Everybody knows that the most important resources go online and they're attracting more and more attention from groups that have either political agendas, groups looking to steal things or make money" said Jeff Durfee, Director of Networking Systems and Security at UNF.
According to JEA, potential hackers turn to the "denial of service attack" when their attempts to break into a system fails.
"One person having access to 10,000 machines could easily set something like this off," said Durfee.
JEA ensures no customer data was breached during the attack.
Although the worst is over, they'll always be on the lookout for the next potential threat.
"This is a 24-hour, seven day a week thing that we have to keep an eye on because of the nature of businesses. Now we do so much over the Internet," said Boyce.
JEA stopped disconnections for those who were not able to pay on time because of the cyber attack.
Today is the last day to pay before you see an interruption in service.
