Lauren Lindstrom reports: A lost flash drive containing the names and Social Security numbers of an undisclosed number of people associated with the University of Toledo prompted the university to send out letters alerting those affected by the “security incident.” A UT faculty member lost an unencrypted flash drive containing personal information belonging to some…
Category: Education Sector
UK: The University of Greenwich fined £120,000 by Information Commissioner for “serious” security breach
The University of Greenwich has been fined £120,000 by the Information Commissioner following a “serious” security breach involving the personal data of nearly 20,000 people – among them students and staff. It is the first university to have been fined by the Commissioner under the existing data protection legislation (Data Protection Act 1998). The investigation…
NY: 2,690 University of Buffalo logins stolen in data breach (updated)
Benjamin Blanchet reports: Thousands of UB community members’ account information have been hacked. On Friday, UB confirmed that J. Brice Bible, vice president and chief information officer, is investigating and responding to a breach of 2,690 UBITName accounts. The breach affects 1,800 student accounts, 862 alumni accounts and 28 faculty and staff accounts, according to…
Bloomfield Hills high schoolers hack database to give themselves better grades
Violet Ikonomova reports: Leave it to kids in one of Michigan’s best school districts to have figured out how to hack the district’s grading system and (presumably) give themselves A’s. A message posted to the Bloomfield Hills Schools website alerts parents that “a couple” students made “some poor choices lately,” hacking into the district’s student…
Human error to blame in vast majority of education data breaches
Mark Satter reports: The nation relies on teachers to educate our children and help them when they make mistakes. But when it comes to protecting students’ data, it is often the teachers and school staff who mistakenly let bad actors in to school computer systems, officials say. In a hearing Thursday before the House Committee…
Gadsden High students accused of changing grades, cannot graduate
KVIA reports: A total of 55 students from Gadsden High School are accused of accessing an online computer program and changing their grades on their online courses. The school said students in various upper grade levels gained access to the access code that allowed them to change the grade of their work on curriculum software…