Lincoln College suffers Ransomware attack
May 11th, 2022 - Written By CyberLabs
Lincoln College is to shut down after 157 years due to ransomware attack?
Lincoln College is situated in the rural parts of Illinois, that is also a liberal arts school, mentioned earlier that they will be shutting down due to severe financial hits on the school from Covid-19 Pandemic and Ransomware attack. It’s been 157 years the school’s founding. This decision was a hard one as the college had survived multiple disasters before, including a major fire in 1912. the Spanish flu, the great depression, the world wars and the 2008 global financial crisis. However, the decision was made to shut down on the 13th of May 2022, after the ransomware attack that happened last December which was also, the final straw.
The college notified the Illinois Department of Higher Education and Higher Learning Commission of the incoming permanent closure, and the board of trustees has already voted to cease all academic activity at the end of spring semester. This school is one of the few rural American colleges that the Department of Education has qualified as a predominantly Black institution as NBC first reported.
“Lincoln College was a victim of a cyberattack in December 2021 that thwarted admissions activities and hindered access to all institutional data, creating an unclear picture of Fall 2022 enrollment projections,” reads an announcement published on the college’s website. “All systems required for recruitment, retention, and fundraising efforts were inoperable. Fortunately, no personal identifying information was exposed”. “Once fully restored in March 2022, the projections displayed significant enrollment shortfalls, requiring a transformational donation or partnership to sustain Lincoln College beyond the current semester.”
This is both tragic and a great loss, not forgetting that it is also the 1st time a school has to shutdown caused by a ransomware attack, but Lincoln is just one of more than 1,000 other schools hit by ransomware last year. 88 Education organizations were unequivocally threatened by ransomware in 2021, including 62 school district and the campuses of 26 colleges and universities across the country, disrupting learning at 1,043 individual schools.
As unfortunate as it sounds, ransomware has been a constant threat to the education sector throughout the years. Educational organizations and institutes were being targeted by malicious actors for data extortion and theft.
