Persistent Disruptive Cyber Activity Impacting U.S. Public Safety Mission-Critical Services

Between 2024 and 2025, opportunistic cyber threat actors (CTAs) increasingly engaged in disruptive attacks against U.S. public safety mission-critical systems, affecting emergency communications and downstream operations. In 2024, 326 cyber attacks impacted municipalities, law enforcement agencies, and other public safety organizations. While overall attacks against public safety fell 12%, Motorola Solutions PSTA observed a 60% increase in attacks against mission-critical technologies such as public safety radio, computer-aided dispatch (CAD), and public safety answering points (PSAPs).

PSTA assesses this shift was likely due to CTAs developing greater understanding of and ability to disrupt mission-critical technologies. These attacks degraded emergency communications and inhibited the efficiency of first responder operations. Improper security configurations across public safety remote access devices, logins, as well as unpatched systems further enabled this trend.

To better secure systems against persistent malicious cyber activity, defenders should maintain awareness of key CTA tradecraft and implement corresponding security measures described in this report.