Following more than two months of uncertainty in the wake of a ransomware attack, the Dallas Central Appraisal District website is back up and running.
The November hack rocked the real estate community and property owners trying to gather information for tax protests and homestead exemptions. The deadline to pay property taxes is Jan. 31.
A “bare bones” site was set up in mid-December, and residents were encouraged to use the tax assessor-collector’s website and other resources. If a homestead exemption has not yet been processed or a protest has not been heard, homeowners were advised to go ahead and pay their bills by the end of the month and expect a refund later.
DCAD Director of Community Relations Cheryl Jordan could not immediately be reached for comment.
A note on the website states that appraisal data was updated today.
Tax expert Glenn Goodrich, founder and CEO of propertytax.io, told daltxrealestate.com earlier this month that he was concerned hackers now have the email addresses of Dallas homeowners — a “honeypot” for scams.
“Since COVID, the appraisal districts have worked almost exclusively with people via email,” Goodrich said. “People tend to send a lot more information than they need to, to the appraisal district, information the appraisal district never asked for, like their social security number. I honestly think it’s a honeypot of personal information that could be used years down the road against people. They package up this information and sell it on some dark web market.”
DCAD officials have not commented on how the hack occurred or what, if any, user information was compromised. We do know that they’re cooperating with federal authorities.
The Travis County Appraisal District website was hacked in early December and was back online within a week.
We’re continuing to follow this story and will post more information as it becomes available at daltxrealestate.com.
