EDMONDS, Wash. — The Edmonds School District (ESD) revealed Friday that sensitive information about students, staff and parents was exposed, more than a week after suspicious activities in its network were detected on Jan. 31.
The district identified information such as names, Social Security numbers, driver’s license numbers, date of birth, student identification numbers, financial account information, medical information, and student records as part of the breach, according to its website.
The district said it is in the process of reviewing the data that was impacted and will contact those who were impacted. The district recommends everyone remain vigilant against identity theft or fraud.
"I frankly don't know how common it is for school districts to have a cybersecurity issue like this,” said Andi Nofziger, president of the Edmonds Education Association. "College acceptance is often dependent on first semester transcripts and right now we can't even enter grades for the first semester let alone print transcripts."
The district said it is installing new security software on all district computers, which "takes time." The new software is necessary for full internet access to be restored for district computers, ESD said in a statement on its website.
Once the technical issues are resolved, district officials said it will work quickly to finalize first-semester grades for all students. There has not been a target date set for when Internet services will resume as normal.
"We understand the hardship our technology issues have caused for our seniors who have college acceptance decisions dependent on access to first semester transcripts," ESD said in a statement. "We are preparing a letter seniors can share with colleges and universities explaining the situation the district is dealing with to make sure these institutions understand the delay is a district issue and not something our students can control. Thank you again for your patience as we continue to work through this issue cautiously."
The district said it disabled all internet access and reset all staff and student passwords on Feb. 1 to mitigate potential security issues.
ESD said on Monday that it canceled a district-wide information budget presentation set for Wednesday. There was no update on when first semester grades would be completed at the time of Monday's update.
"We can't access student information so if we need to call home, we can't get parents' phone numbers. We can't access the class list. We are teaching in the 1980s again,” Nofziger said.
Parents were asked to call or visit school offices with urgent communication needs because email services remain unavailable.
Schools across the district have still had access to phones, fire alarm systems, most building intercoms and HVAC systems during the internet outage, however.
The district said staff and students will be required to reset their passwords once internet service is restored.
This is a developing story. Check back for updates.
Download our free KING 5 app to stay up-to-date on news stories from across western Washington.