Computer hackers apparently based in China attempted to gain access early Tuesday to key databases and protected files on The Blade’s website, toledoblade.com, and its editorial content management system, but were thwarted by security cyber-barriers in place.

Michael Rusert, senior executive consultant for The Blade’s Libercus content management system, said technicians were investigating why the company’s computer system went offline for a period on Monday evening and inadvertently discovered the hacking attempts, which occurred after 1 a.m. Tuesday.

The two incidents were not related, Mr. Rusert said. “I don’t think there’s much to it, but it’s certainly interesting. And we’re going to be keeping a close eye on it,” he said.

Records show someone, or perhaps a rogue program, made more than two dozen attempts to log into databases containing application program files and stored data that create and control both The Blade’s website and its copy editing system, Mr. Rusert said.

The apps are hosted on Microsoft Corp.’s Windows Azure cloud-computing platform.

“Our databases on Azure, that’s what they were trying to log into,” he said.

Hacking attempts were traced to an Internet address believed to be in China, he said.

“It’s probably pretty common. They probably have banks of hackers that try to log into different databases everywhere and I would think the news media is a prime target for them,” Mr. Rusert said.

John Crisp, vice president of new media for The Blade and chief executive officer of Libercus, said the company was working Tuesday with Microsoft to ensure the latest security protocols are in place to prevent further attacks.

“We’ll be doing active monitoring to make sure we don’t have any attacks from any other directions,” he said.

Contact Jon Chavez at: jchavez@theblade.com or 419-724-6128.

First Published April 27, 2016, 4:00 a.m.