Colleges and schools across US dealing with ransomware incidents, cyberattacks

Thousands of students at several U.S. schools started the week feeling the impact of ransomware attacks and other cybersecurity incidents. Bluefield University — a private Baptist school in Bluefield, Virginia serving about 1,000 students – published a statement on Sunday announcing that their systems “have been shut down for an unknown period of time due to a recent cybersecurity attack.” Two hours away across the border in West Virginia, BridgeValley Community and Technical College said it continued to deal with a ransomware attack that is now believed to be the work of the Akira cybercrime gang. Meanwhile, Penncrest School District — which serves thousands of students in Crawford County, Pennsylvania — announced a ransomware attack over the weekend that disrupted their systems, while Nashua School District in New Hampshire said it was investigating a cyberattack. The attacks continue a trend in 2023 of ransomware gangs targeting small colleges and K-12 institutions with cyberattacks. Just last week, Truman State University in Kirksville, Missouri said it is in the process of recovering from a “cybersecurity virus attack” that forced it to shut down the campus network and order all school-issued devices to be turned off. Administrators at Bluefield University said they decided to shut down their systems “in an effort to maintain system integrity during the investigation and remediation process.”

https://therecord.media/colleges-schools-suffer-from-ransomware-and-cyberattacks