Hacking group, The Dark Overlord previously successful in hacking Netflix, are now linked to a series of attacks across the United States, with dozens of schools falling victim. 

This month the US Department of Education issued a cyberadvisory warning of hacks by the likes of The Dark Overlord and others, saying schools have long been targets for cyber thieves and criminals.

“We are writing to let you know of a new threat, where the criminals are seeking to extort money from school districts and other educational institutions on the threat of releasing sensitive data from student records.”

…criminals are seeking to extort money from schools..

The Department said that attackers are likely targeting districts with weak data security, or well known vulnerabilities that enable the attackers to gain access to sensitive data. This may be in the form of electronic attacks against school/district computers or applications, malicious software, or even through phishing attacks against staff or employees.

Dark Overlord have also been deemed responsible for shutting down more than 30 schools for three days in September after demanding $150,000 in Bitcoin for not publishing stolen sensitive school records. This attack was more made more sinister with school students receiving text messages from the hackers referencing previous school massacres.

Schools are encouraged to protect themselves from attack by:

– Conducting security audits to identify weaknesses and update/patch vulnerable systems
– Ensuring proper audit logs are created and reviewed routinely for suspicious activity
– Training staff and students on data security best practices and phishing/social engineering awareness
– Reviewing all sensitive data to verify that outside access is appropriately limited.

Leading learning enablement and cybersafety specialist CyberHound is able to help schools protect against attacks.
Find out more by visiting the Cyber Security and Web Filtering pages or contact us today.

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