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…
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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…
New Study of School Websites Reveals Widespread Online Security and Privacy Issues
According to a new study released today by EdTech Strategies, Tracking: EDU – Education Agency Website Security and Privacy Practices, state and local education agency websites were found to lack important security and privacy protections for students, families, and educators. “State department of education and school district websites have become indispensable for accessing information about…
University of Baltimore exposed student identity information for more than three years: auditors (UPDATED)
Jan. 29 – please see update under this post. Meredith Cohn reports on a breach involving University of Baltimore student data: The University of Baltimore has added protections to personal student data that officials had left unsecured possibly for years, according to a state audit released this month. The information on 117,793 students was kept…
Jail for man who hacked 1000 student email accounts in search for sexually explicit images
There’s a follow-up to a case I previously noted on this site in November, 2016. Graham Cluley reports: A 30-year-old man has sentenced to six months in prison, after he was found guilty of accessing more than 1,000 email accounts at a New York City-area university in a hunt for sexually explicit photographs and videos…