Hackers targeted the second-largest school district in the US with a cyber-attack over Labor Day weekend, officials at Los Angeles unified school district have confirmed.
The district characterized the cyber-attack as a “significant disruption to our system’s infrastructure” but officials said they did not expect major problems with teaching or such services as transportation and food. It said business operations might be delayed or modified.
Classes were scheduled to take place as usual Tuesday morning, the district – which includes more than 600,000 students in kindergarten through 12th grade – said in a statement.
“Since the identification of the incident, which is likely criminal in nature, we continue to assess the situation with law enforcement agencies,” the district said, adding that a “response protocol” was implemented to mitigate districtwide disruptions, including access to email, computer systems and applications.
The district said the investigation and response involved the White House, the US Department of Education, the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency.
The attack comes as ransomware is on the rise, targeting the education sector at higher rates than it had been before. In August and September 2021, 57% of ransomware incidents reported to the FBI involved K-12 schools compared to 28% of incidents from January through July.
In 2021 56% of K-12 schools and 64% of higher education organizations surveyed by digital security firm Sophos reported being hit by some type of ransomware.
The increase has come as the Covid pandemic forced much of the education sector online, while schools struggle to keep up security practices. In an advisory to schools released in 2021, the FBI suggested more training of employees to monitor networks for suspicious activities.
The FBI suggests not paying ransoms, but 45% of K-12 victims and 50% in higher education reported paying the ransom to reinstate lost data.
It is not clear if LAUSD paid the ransom in this attack, but the district is calling for an independent taskforce to help prevent future attacks.
The Associated Press contributed to this report
