Access privileges permit university compromise
Two work-study students at Dominican University in River Forest, Ill., near Chicago, misused their passwords to access Excel files containing student and alumni data.
How many victims? About 5,000.
What type of personal information? Names, Social Security numbers, addresses, phone numbers and birth dates contained on three spreadsheets dating back to 2003, 2005 and 2007.
What was the response? Affected individuals were encouraged to place a fraud alert on their accounts.
Details:Officials do not believe any of the information has been misused. The students who accessed the data are back at school and are cooperating with authorities in their investigation.
Source: NBC5.com, WMAQ-TV, “University says there’s no reson to believe information was misused,” May 8.
[...] over 5,000 current students and alumni from 2003, 2005, and 2007. First reported (to me anyway), here, it appears the problem was due to the misuse of access granted to part-time work-study students [...]