On January 31, 2018, the FBI released a Private Industry Notification (PIN) warning schools about the hacker(s) known as TheDarkOverlord. The information in the PIN was provided by the FBI and the Department of Education’s Office of the Inspector General, and it appears to be an expanded version of a prior alert to schools issued by…
Category: Education Sector
What to Know About ED’s New Stance On Data Breach Reporting
Sean Tassi reports: Until recently, colleges and universities that experienced a data breach had no unique reporting obligations to the U.S. Department of Education. Institutions were expected to analyze security incidents under applicable federal and state laws and, when appropriate, notify affected individuals and appropriate federal and state agencies. Because the Family Educational Rights and…
IL: Reinstated school district IT Director sues school board over breach response
In May, 2016, this site noted a breach report from Abingdon-Avon School District in Illinois. One month later, we noted a news report that their IT Director, identified at the time as Mark Rodgers (sic), had been arrested, although it wasn’t clear if the felony eavesdropping charges were directly related to the breach. Not reported…
A (Secondary) Education in Data Security
Christina Seda and Peter A. Nelson of Patterson Belknap write: On January 18, 2018, the New York State Education Department (“NYSED”) announced that one of its vendors, Questar Assessment, experienced a data breach resulting in the unauthorized disclosure of personal information from students in five different New York schools. While the data breach reportedly affected…
Columbia University grad arrested for using key logger software
Robert Abel reports: A Columbia University grad student was arrested for leaving key logger malware on USB sticks left throughout the campus. Bill Liang Lin Wu, 23 was arrested Thursday after he was caught on camera leaving the credential stealing devices on a host of university computers shared by 14 professors. Wu graduated last spring…
12 UNC employees’ personal information comprised in cybersecurity breach
Tommy Wood reports: The private information of 12 University of Northern Colorado employees was compromised last week after an “unknown person or group” accessed their profiles on Ursa, UNC’s online portal, according to a release from the university. Whoever is responsible for the breach tried to log in to the employees’ Ursa accounts, then used…