He proved the Columbus data leak hurts the public. Now, the city has silenced him

COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) — A judge has ordered a cybersecurity expert to halt his work, weeks after disproving Mayor Andrew Ginther’s claim there was nothing to worry about in Columbus data leaked on the dark web.

A request for the ex parte temporary restraining order came as part of a civil lawsuit against Connor Goodwolf in Franklin County Common Pleas Court. Filed Thursday by City Attorney Zach Klein’s office, court records showed presiding Judge Andria Noble granted the restraint the same day. The ex parte aspect meant she didn’t need any input from the cybersecurity expert before doing so.

Noble has served as a judge in Franklin County Common Pleas Court for close to two years. Before that, she spent over a decade working in the city attorney’s office, according to her LinkedIn profile. From 2019 to 2023, she was an assistant city attorney under Klein.

At an afternoon news conference, Klein explained his reasoning behind shutting Goodwolf’s work down, and why he didn’t file anything when the expert first came forward Aug. 13.

“This is not about freedom of speech, or whistleblowing, this is about the downloading and disclosure of stolen criminal investigatory records,” Klein said. “This effect is to get him to stop downloading and disclosing stolen criminal records … It has gone to the next level to where there is witnesses, potential suspects, undercover officers whose data is out there.”

Klein’s filings don’t pin the blame on Goodwolf for stealing the data originally, as the Rhysida ransomware group claimed responsibility for the attack detected July 18. But his office’s motion for a restraining order asked the court to prevent Goodwolf from “accessing, and/or downloading, and/or disseminating the city’s data that has been stolen as part of a massive cyberattack of the city’s IT system.” The approved restraining order remained inaccessible in Franklin County Common Pleas Court records as of Friday morning.

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The lawsuit’s complaint document from Klein’s office accused Goodwolf of creating “serious public inconvenience and alarm” from showing the damage done when Rhysida leaked three terabytes of stolen data from City of Columbus servers. Klein’s office specifically took issue with him showing media outlets the information that is already publicly accessible on the dark web, a portion of the internet unseen by Google and other search results, but that can be explored with the free browser Tor.

“If there is information that needs to be brought forward, there is a way to disclose that information to law enforcement, and not going directly to the media, and this is why we had to file the TRO,” Klein said.

However, Goodwolf provided NBC4 with screenshots of his call history, showing he did reach out to the city multiple times without any luck. The phone numbers on the list included at least four staff members in Klein’s office, but the city attorney denied having any knowledge of this during the news conference.

Hours after Ginther announced Aug. 13 that the data stolen by the hackers was “encrypted or corrupted,” Goodwolf debunked him, showing NBC4 that personal information like Social Security numbers of residents and city employees alike had been dumped on the dark web. The mayor, for his part, piled on against Goodwolf after the lawsuit’s filing.

“City Attorney Klein’s actions show there are consequences for anyone who downloads and distributes the city’s stolen confidential data,” Ginther wrote.

Kirsten Fraser, an attorney at Organ Law, had a different opinion on the situation.

“My first reaction to seeing the complaint and the temporary restraining order was that it appeared that the city was trying to shift blame for the fact that this data is out there … Simply accessing the dark web, I don’t believe, by itself, constitutes a crime,” Fraser said. “It would be doing something further. So, you can see what’s out there without taking action.”

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The city attorney’s filing comes the day after Goodwolf discovered the Columbus Division of Police’s MatrixCrime database in the leak, which meant undercover officers’ names and confidential reports had been exposed by Rhysida. The City of Columbus is facing two separate class-action lawsuits over its handling of the leak, with one coming from an undercover officer concerned his cover had been blown.

In its lawsuit, the city is asking the court to order Goodwolf to pay damages “greater than $25,000,” with the final amount to be determined at a later date. Klein’s claims for relief against the whistleblower included:

• Damages for criminal acts

• Invasion of privacy against the City of Columbus, employees and citizens

• Negligence

• Civil conversion

Franklin County Common Pleas Court scheduled a pretrial conference for Sept. 18, 2025, followed by a trial assignment in October 2025. In the more immediate months, the case will see initial disclosures from both sides, as well as discovery, where they will exchange the evidence they plan to present.

View the city’s filed complaint against Goodwolf below:

Complaint-240829Download

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