University Of Maryland Hacker Nabs SS# Trove

In a statement on the university's website today, University of Maryland President Wallace Loh revealed a security breach resulting in hundreds of thousands of compromised social security numbers, as well names, university IDs, and dates of birth. Calling it a "sophisticated computer security attack," Loh stated all relevant parties that have been issued a university ID since 1998 are at risk.

Loh was informed of the security breach yesterday evening by the university's VP of Information Technology, Brian Voss, saying a database of records containing personal information about students, faculty, staff, and affiliated personnel was breached. This goes for applicable individuals located at the university's Shady Grove and College Park campuses, as well.

A total of 309,079 records were exposed in the hack, fortunately none of which contained contact info, academic details, financial information, or health data. The cause of the breach is being determined in an investigation with state and federal authorities, as well as a university task force. All individuals affected will be provided with free credit monitoring for up to a year as a result.

Said Loh in the statement: "Universities are a focus in today's global assaults on IT systems. We recently doubled the number of our IT security engineers and analysts. We also doubled our investment in top-end security tools. Obviously, we need to do more and better, and we will. Again, I regret this breach of our computer and data systems. We are doing everything possible to protect any personal information that may be compromised."

VIA: LA Times

SOURCE: University of Maryland