This article was originally published in District Administration on 6.28.23 by Micah Ward, Staff Writer at District Administration
After a troubling year filled with high-profile ransomware attacks, education leaders are leveraging opportunities this summer to raise awareness and enhance prevention tactics.
If district leaders learned one thing this year about cybersecurity, it’s that no one is safe. Technology use in the education sector has exploded since the pandemic, creating even more points of entry for cybercriminals to attack. With the 2022-23 school year under wraps, district leaders and policymakers are using this time to reflect and react accordingly to improve cybersecurity.
One of the latest and most notable targets involved schools across New York City after tens of thousands of public school students and employees were notified that their personal data had been stolen after hackers breached the Department of Education’s MOVEit file transfer software. In an email sent to parents on Sunday, the agency explained that the breach impacted an estimated 45,000 students. In some cases, personal data including social security numbers and birthdates were compromised.
Security breaches like this occurred in several large school districts throughout the school year, including the Los Angeles Unified School District, Minneapolis Public Schools and the Tucson Unified School District. As a result, other districts are using these cases as lessons to further bolster their own security tactics…
