Latest news with #NorthCarolinaDepartmentofPublicInstruction
Yahoo
6 days ago
- General
- Yahoo
North Carolina students experience computer outage during End-of-Grade testing: NCDPI
RALEIGH, N.C. (WNCN) — Students across North Carolina experienced a state-wide computer outage while taking their End-of-Grade tests Wednesday morning, officials said. According to the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction, NCTest stopped functioning properly due to a system error. The outage lasted approximately 40 minutes. All students in North Carolina who were taking the EOG test on Wednesday morning were affected by the outage, according to NCDPI. State officials said approximately 120,000 students went back to taking the EOG test after they were able to resolve the outage. In the Wake County Public School System, the computer systems went offline at around 9:45 a.m. and returned by 10:30 a.m. All Wake County students are believed to have been able to continue taking their tests, according to district officials. According to Cumberland County Schools officials, students taking the Read-to-Achieve assessment and students enrolled in the summer program were among those affected by the outage. Some were disconnected while taking the test and others could not log in. 'Most sites kept students in testing locations, provided snacks as needed, and resumed testing once the system was restored. Durham Public Schools officials said they also experienced a 40-minute outage before the system came back online. Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools was not affected by the outage due to testing not scheduled to begin until Friday, according to district officials. Schools that did not continue the EOG tests on Wednesday may allow students to take the test on Thursday or begin a new test administration that day. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Business Mayor
18-05-2025
- Business Mayor
School districts hit with extortion attempts after PowerSchool breach
One of the largest providers of education tech paid off hackers so that they wouldn't publish tens of millions of children's personal information. But school districts are facing extortion attempts anyway. The company, PowerSchool, missed a basic cybersecurity step, according to a cybersecurity audit obtained by NBC News, and was hacked last year, leading to one of the largest breaches to date of American children's personal data. PowerSchool reportedly paid an undisclosed sum to the hackers in exchange for a video of them purporting to delete the files they had stolen, which included some students' Social Security numbers and other information, like health and disciplinary records. But 'a threat actor' is using that stolen data to try to extort schools and school districts in both the U.S. and Canada, according to statements from PowerSchool and various school districts issued Wednesday. 'PowerSchool is aware that a threat actor has reached out to multiple school district customers in an attempt to extort them using data from the previously reported December 2024 incident,' PowerSchool wrote in a statement Wednesday. 'We do not believe this is a new incident, as samples of data match the data previously stolen in December.' Public schools across North Carolina received extortion emails Wednesday morning, North Carolina Department of Public Instruction Superintendent Mo Green said in a public bulletin. The threat actor appears to have students' and staffers' names, contact information, birthdays, medical information, parental information, and in some cases Social Security numbers, he said. Several Canadian school authorities have announced they are also among the victims, including the Peel District School Board in Ontario and the Toronto District School Board. The Calgary Board of Education also issued a warning to parents this week based on communication it had received from PowerSchool. It was not immediately clear who was behind the current extortion attempt. PowerSchool said it believes that the threat actor is using data stolen from the original incident last year, indicating that the original hackers either are behind the current attempts or kept the data and made it accessible to other people. 'We have reported this matter to law enforcement both in the United States and in Canada and are working closely with our customers to support them. We sincerely regret these developments– it pains us that our customers are being threatened and re-victimized by bad actors,' PowerSchool's statement said. 'As is always the case with these situations, there was a risk that the bad actors would not delete the data they stole, despite assurances and evidence that were provided to us,' it said. It is not clear if other American school districts had been victims of the renewed extortion attempt. PowerSchool declined to name victims, saying only that it was aware of 'multiple school district customers.' A majority of U.S. states have at least one school district that was affected by the original breach. PowerSchool is one of the largest companies in the educational technology industry, which became particularly widespread during the Covid pandemic and uses software to streamline school processes. One of its primary programs helps school districts track students, and the company servers stored information like their names, family members, addresses and birthdays.
Yahoo
09-05-2025
- Yahoo
Hackers again demand ransom for schools' data
Stolen personal student and teacher information that was supposed to be destroyed after a ransom was paid is now being used to extort individual school districts. In December, a hacker gained access to personal data for students and teachers around the world in the database for the PowerSchool student information system. PowerSchool told users that the hacker destroyed the data, but now that same data is being used to get ransoms from individual school districts. Ransom demands have been sent to school districts across the U.S. and Canada, including at least 20 North Carolina school districts and the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction. The hacker wants Bitcoin in exchange for destroying the data, according to Vanessa Wren, chief information officer for DPI. The North Carolina Department of Public Instruction will not engage with those making the threats, State Superintendent Mo Green said at a news conference Wednesday. State officials did not release the names of the school districts that received the ransom demand in emails on Wednesday, but Green said they have been told not to engage with those making the threats. The data affected goes back to 2013, when all North Carolina public schools began using PowerSchool. PowerSchool is used to record information such as student attendance, grades and class schedules. In a decision made before the latest breach, all North Carolina public schools will switch to using a different system called Infinite Campus by July 1. 'It is certainly unacceptable that these families and public servants have had the data compromised again and going through what we just went through a few months ago,' Green said. 'It is completely unfortunate that the perpetrators are preying on innocent children and dedicated public servants.' Wrenn said PowerSchool believes the new threat is coming from the same hacker who stole the data but can't confirm that yet. Law enforcement in the U.S. and Canada are investigating. In a statement Wednesday, PowerSchool confirmed it had paid a ransom to the hacker in hopes of having the data destroyed. The company says the hacker did not honor the deal. 'PowerSchool is aware that a threat actor has reached out to multiple school district customers in an attempt to extort them using data from the previously reported December 2024 incident,' PowerSchool said in its statement. 'We do not believe this is a new incident, as samples of data match the data previously stolen in December.' PowerSchool has provided free credit monitoring to people affected by the data breach. It urged people concerned about the data breach to go to to take advantage of the credit monitoring services. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency LLC.
Yahoo
08-05-2025
- Yahoo
School districts hit with extortion attempts months after education tech data breach
One of the largest providers of education tech paid off hackers so that they wouldn't publish tens of millions of children's personal information. But school districts are facing extortion attempts anyway. The company, PowerSchool, missed a basic cybersecurity step, according to a cybersecurity audit obtained by NBC News, and was hacked last year, leading to one of the largest breaches to date of American children's personal data. PowerSchool reportedly paid an undisclosed sum to the hackers in exchange for a video of them purporting to delete the files they had stolen, which included some students' Social Security numbers and other information, like health and disciplinary records. But "a threat actor" is using that stolen data to try to extort schools and school districts in both the U.S. and Canada, according to statements from PowerSchool and various school districts issued Wednesday. "PowerSchool is aware that a threat actor has reached out to multiple school district customers in an attempt to extort them using data from the previously reported December 2024 incident," PowerSchool wrote in a statement Wednesday. "We do not believe this is a new incident, as samples of data match the data previously stolen in December." Public schools across North Carolina received extortion emails Wednesday morning, North Carolina Department of Public Instruction Superintendent Mo Green said in a public bulletin. The threat actor appears to have students' and staffers' names, contact information, birthdays, medical information, parental information, and in some cases Social Security numbers, he said. Several Canadian school authorities have announced they are also among the victims, including the Peel District School Board in Ontario and the Toronto District School Board. The Calgary Board of Education also issued a warning to parents this week based on communication it had received from PowerSchool. It was not immediately clear who was behind the current extortion attempt. PowerSchool said it believes that the threat actor is using data stolen from the original incident last year, indicating that the original hackers either are behind the current attempts or kept the data and made it accessible to other people. 'We have reported this matter to law enforcement both in the United States and in Canada and are working closely with our customers to support them. We sincerely regret these developments– it pains us that our customers are being threatened and re-victimized by bad actors,' PowerSchool's statement said. 'As is always the case with these situations, there was a risk that the bad actors would not delete the data they stole, despite assurances and evidence that were provided to us,' it said. It is not clear if other American school districts had been victims of the renewed extortion attempt. PowerSchool declined to name victims, saying only that it was aware of 'multiple school district customers.' A majority of U.S. states have at least one school district that was affected by the original breach. PowerSchool is one of the largest companies in the educational technology industry, which became particularly widespread during the Covid pandemic and uses software to streamline school processes. One of its primary programs helps school districts track students, and the company servers stored information like their names, family members, addresses and birthdays. This article was originally published on
NBC News
07-05-2025
- NBC News
School districts hit with extortion attempts months after education tech data breach
One of the largest providers of education tech paid off hackers so that they wouldn't publish tens of millions of children's personal information. But school districts are facing extortion attempts anyway. The company, PowerSchool, missed a basic cybersecurity step, according to a cybersecurity audit obtained by NBC News, and was hacked last year, leading to one of the largest breaches to date of American children's personal data. PowerSchool reportedly paid an undisclosed sum to the hackers in exchange for a video of them purporting to delete the files they had stolen, which included some students' Social Security numbers and other information, like health and disciplinary records. But "a threat actor" is using that stolen data to try to extort schools and school districts in both the U.S. and Canada, according to statements from PowerSchool and various school districts issued Wednesday. "PowerSchool is aware that a threat actor has reached out to multiple school district customers in an attempt to extort them using data from the previously reported December 2024 incident," PowerSchool wrote in a statement Wednesday. "We do not believe this is a new incident, as samples of data match the data previously stolen in December." Public schools across North Carolina received extortion emails Wednesday morning, North Carolina Department of Public Instruction Superintendent Mo Green said in a public bulletin. The threat actor appears to have students' and staffers' names, contact information, birthdays, medical information, parental information, and in some cases Social Security numbers, he said. Several Canadian school authorities have announced they are also among the victims, including the Peel District School Board in Ontario and the Toronto District School Board. The Calgary Board of Education also issued a warning to parents this week based on communication it had received from PowerSchool. It was not immediately clear who was behind the current extortion attempt. PowerSchool said it believes that the threat actor is using data stolen from the original incident last year, indicating that the original hackers either are behind the current attempts or kept the data and made it accessible to other people. 'We have reported this matter to law enforcement both in the United States and in Canada and are working closely with our customers to support them. We sincerely regret these developments– it pains us that our customers are being threatened and re-victimized by bad actors,' PowerSchool's statement said. 'As is always the case with these situations, there was a risk that the bad actors would not delete the data they stole, despite assurances and evidence that were provided to us,' it said. It is not clear if other American school districts had been victims of the renewed extortion attempt. PowerSchool declined to name victims, saying only that it was aware of 'multiple school district customers.' A majority of U.S. states have at least one school district that was affected by the original breach. PowerSchool is one of the largest companies in the educational technology industry, which became particularly widespread during the Covid pandemic and uses software to streamline school processes. One of its primary programs helps school districts track students, and the company servers stored information like their names, family members, addresses and birthdays.
