Virus found on district server
Officials working to determine seriousness of virus on school district’s computer system
TROY>> Troy City School District officials are trying to determine if any confidential student information was accessed on one of its computer server after a virus was detected late last week.
In a notice posted on the district’s website, officials said they were alerted Thursday that a Trojan horse virus had been found on a server that contained some personal data for students, including contact and household income information. The district said, however, that information did not include social security numbers.
“We are still in the preliminary stages of the investigation, but are working around the clock to determine the scope and breadth of the problem, if any,” the district said on its website.
District spokeswoman Erin Clary said Monday afternoon that investigation is continuing and that no new information was available.
A Trojan horse virus can take on many different forms, according to Internet security firm Kaspersky Lab, but is generally used by hackers trying to gain access to a user’s system. Users are usually tricked in some way into loading and executing Trojan horses on their systems, Kaspersky Lab says, allowing cyber- criminals to spy on them, steal sensitive data and gain backdoor access to their system.
As soon as the district was notified of the virus, administrators immediately contacted state
and local police, the affected server was disabled to ensure the virus was contained and an experienced cybersecurity firm was brought in to determine if any data had been compromised.
Once a hacker has taken control of a computer with a Trojan horse, Kaspersky Lab says, that person can copy, modify, delete or block data and otherwise disrupt the performance of a computer or even an entire network. Unlike worms and other forms of computer viruses, however, Kaspersky says Trojan horses are not able to selfreplicate to spread themselves to other computers.
The district is working around the clock to determine the extent of the breach, and said if share any updated information on its website at www. troycsd.org. If it is determined that any data was compromised, the district will also directly notify the parents of affected students.
“We want to assure parents and students that the district considers student privacy and the security of student data to be critically important,” the online notice said, “and we will continue to do everything possible to safeguard student information.”