Kelly Field reports: Angry lawmakers hammered the Education Department’s chief information officer, Danny A. Harris, at a hearing Tuesday, accusing him of ethical lapses and failing to secure the agency’s “vulnerable” information systems. “Cybersecurity for the federal government is a matter of quality management and effective leadership, not just tech,” said Rep. Will Hurd, a Texas Republican…
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Ministry of Education failed to protect personal information involving missing portable hard drive
VICTORIA—In an investigation report released today, B.C. Information and Privacy Commissioner Elizabeth Denham found that the Ministry of Education failed to protect the personal information of 3.4 million B.C. and Yukon students stored on a portable hard drive. “This investigation is unique in that we are looking at events that happened more than four years ago. The passage of…
U.S. Education Dept. ripe for breach more devastating than OPM’s
Teri Robinson reports: The Department of Education is primed for a large data breach that could eclipse the one experienced by the Office of Personnel and Management (OPM), House Oversight Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) said last week at a Brookings Institute function. With its rich set of data, including 139 million Social Security numbers and information…
INFORMATION SECURITY: Department of Education and Other Federal Agencies Need to Better Implement Controls – GAO
From a newly released GAO report: Cyber-based risks to federal systems and information can come from unintentional threats, such as natural disasters, software coding errors, and poorly trained or careless employees, or intentional threats, such as disgruntled insiders, hackers, or hostile nations. These threat sources may exploit vulnerabilities in agencies’ systems and networks to steal…
WV: Hacker claiming to be part of Islamic State hacks Wayne County Board of Education website, redirects visitors to site promoting terrorism
The State Journal reports: Someone claiming to be part of the Islamic State hacked the Wayne County Board of Education’s website in the early morning hours of Sept. 2, authorities report. West Virginia State Police Lt. Michael Baylous said the hack redirected internet users trying to access the board’s site to “another site which promotes…
Higher Education Institutions Increasingly Falling Victim to Cyberattacks
Anna C. Watterson and Sean B. Hoar write: Higher education institutions are treasure troves for hackers. Colleges and universities are huge repositories of research data, sensitive information for large populations of applicants and enrolled students (personal, academic, financial and health data), as well as sensitive personal and tax information for all faculty and staff. Higher education…