The websites of Oxfordshire County Council and Oxford City Council have been taken offline as a precaution while a global security issue affecting website technology is investigated.
The disruption follows a warning about a critical security vulnerability affecting PHP, a programming language used to run websites. Organisations were advised to apply temporary mitigations or take affected systems offline until they could do so.
The National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) has urged organisations using PHP to update to the latest fixed version, while those running older versions have been encouraged to move to a fully supported release.
The vulnerability could allow attackers to compromise websites. However, there is no evidence in the information released by the two councils that either authority has suffered a cyberattack.
Oxford City Council said its website was temporarily unavailable as a precaution because of a worldwide issue affecting the underlying technology. It explicitly stated that the outage was “not a cyber incident”.
Residents can still contact the city council by telephone on 01865 249811.
Oxfordshire County Council has also taken its main website and multiple web services offline. The website normally provides access to services including parking, traffic filter permits, library accounts, social care and community support.
The authority has established a temporary website to help residents with urgent matters, including safeguarding, schools, permits and household waste recycling centre bookings. It said its regular web address would redirect users to the temporary service.
The county council has advised residents with urgent issues to contact its contact centre on 01865 519800, warning that call volumes may be high. Those with non-urgent enquiries have been asked to contact the authority at a later date.
The disruption has affected other organisations internationally, with reports of websites operated by government bodies and other public services being taken offline while the vulnerability is addressed.
The councils have not confirmed when their usual websites will be restored. Residents should check the authorities’ official communication channels for updates.
Reporting contribution by Isabella Harris, Local Democracy Reporter (LDR) for Oxfordshire, covering local politics, council meetings and planning decisions across six councils in the county.
