HCC Declares Computer Hack
Housatonic Community College has announced that an online data hack recently made public
some 87,000 confidential records pertaining to students, faculty and other employees that
were prone to possible misuse, published boston.com on April 12, 2012.
Precisely, during the security breach, a 0-day malware infected two PCs of the HCC that led
to stored files getting exposed and as a result access by unauthorized entities. The files
basically consisted of Personal Identifiable Information -names, birth dates, addresses as
well as Social Security Numbers of the college community. According to the investigation
procedure, all affected persons would be informed about the incident in writing, the
officials declared.
Incidentally, the malware became evident when the regular late-hourly computer-scans were
being conducted. Instantly, the infected PCs were segregated and sent for forensic
examinations to the Hartford-located system office of the Connecticut State Colleges and
Universities. The examination reportedly confirmed the contents potentially exposed via the
breach.
Regretting about the inconvenience caused, Anita T. Gliniecki President of HCC said that
the college was deeply concerned about the affected people for it regarded the safety
towards personal information with great seriousness. It was therefore taking measures for
preventing such happenings again via adopting fresh operational and technical regulators,
she explained. Ctpost.com published this on April 12, 2012.
The college, now, is thinking about assessing the attack elaborately as also has decided
about altering the manner of accessing information inside the college. Consequently, HCC
may introduce fresh software for stopping computer-infections from viruses.
The college also stated that it had meanwhile trained every employee and faculty member of
how to treat virus-laden e-mails while emphasizing on such training in future too.
HCC, moreover, is providing the people whose information became public an ID-theft
safeguard service for 2-years from the credit-monitoring as well as support-service company
AllClearID.
Remarking about this new assault, security researchers in general stated that colleges and
universities were the chief targets in hacking incidences that helped to easily unleash
various items of private data.
Importantly, in January 2012, a similar data breach occurred at City College of San
Francisco when malware affected over 3,000 employees' and 100,000 students' information.
Related article: Hack.Huigezi Virus Attacks China PCs Rapidly
» SPAMfighter News - 4/20/2012
