Officials have confirmed that court and other systems in Fulton County, Georgia, the state's most populous county, were hacked over the weekend, causing an interruption in routine operations. However, it has been assured that the ongoing racketeering case against former President Donald Trump remains unaffected.

Fulton County, which encompasses most of Atlanta, is currently experiencing a "widespread system outage" resulting from a cybersecurity incident, according to Robb Pitts, the chair of the county commission. In a video posted on social media on Monday, Pitts stated that the county's phone, court, and tax systems were all affected by the outage.

Amidst this disruption, the office of Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis has assured that the racketeering case against Trump and others is not impacted. In a statement, Willis's office confirmed that all materials related to the election case are stored in a separate, highly secure system that was not breached. The system is designed to make unauthorized access extremely difficult, if not impossible.

However, the prosecutor's office admitted that their operations are being "drastically" affected by the electronic court filing system outage. Visitors attempting to access Fulton County's online court records were met with a message indicating that the website was temporarily unavailable.

Another consequence of the cybersecurity incident is the Atlanta Police Department's cautionary measures. The department is currently refraining from sending or opening emails from the district attorney's office due to concerns for their own systems. This hindrance is impacting the work of the prosecutors since approximately 85% of their cases stem from the Atlanta police.

A Fulton County grand jury had indicted Trump and 18 others in August, accusing them of engaging in an extensive scheme to unlawfully overturn the 2020 election results in Georgia. While four individuals have already pleaded guilty, Trump and the remaining defendants have maintained their pleas of not guilty.

Robb Pitts reported the system outage to law enforcement officials, and an investigation is currently underway. The FBI office in Atlanta has confirmed its awareness of the breach and has remained in contact with the county's information technology department, though specific details are being withheld.

As of Tuesday, there is no estimated timeline for when the system outage will be resolved, according to Fulton County spokesperson Jessica Corbitt. Most county offices have remained open, although certain transactions have been limited due to the ongoing disruption.

The situation highlights the pressing need for enhanced cybersecurity measures to protect critical systems and safeguard sensitive information. Authorities are actively working to rectify the situation and restore normal operations in Fulton County.