Washoe County School District data breach exposes 144,000 former students personal information

Exploit: Unauthorized database access
Washoe County School District: Public school district providing educational services to students in Washoe County, Nevada

Risk to Small Business: 2.111 = Severe: A data breach at one of the district’s contractors, Pearson, compromised students’ personally identifiable information. Even though the district isn’t directly responsible for the data breach, they will still incur the cost of providing credit and identity monitoring services to thousands of victims, and their already strapped budgets will be further strained by the recovery efforts.

Individual Risk: 2.714 = Moderate Risk: The data breach impacts students who attended the school district between 2001 and 2016, and it includes student names and dates of birth. Some staff names and email addresses were also accessed during the breach. Those impacted by the breach should enroll in the district-provided credit and identity monitoring services to ensure their information’s long-term integrity.

Customers Impacted: 144,000
How it Could Affect Your Customers’ Business: Even when an organization isn’t directly responsible for a data breach, they are still charged with helping victims recover from the episode and for strengthening the cybersecurity standards going forward. Especially when minors are involved, knowing what happens to people’s information after it leaves your network is a good place to start.