Ransomware destroyed US college

Lincoln College announced the closure of the institution due to financial problems caused by the pandemic and worsened by...amid a ransomware attack last December. This is the first time that an educational institution in the US has closed due to a hack.

The college was founded in 1865 and named afterPresident Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln College, which survived several recessions, a major fire in 1912, the Spanish flu of 1918, the Great Depression, World War II and the 2008 global financial crisis, was unable to cope with modern problems such as coronavirus and hacker attacks.

With the advent of COVID-19, the institution has suffered hugefinancial costs due to a reduction in students and investment in technology needed to support distance learning. The last straw was a ransomware attack in December last year that affected accounting, storage, and fundraising systems.

The announcement of the closure of the college first appeared in March and informed that in the absence of funding, the educational institution would have to close on May 13.

The ransomware attack “interrupted reception andaccess to all of the institution's data, creating a blurry picture of recruitment projections for fall 2022." At the same time, the college management claims that there is no leakage of confidential data.

According to a company operating in the fieldsecurity, Emsisoft, 26 colleges and 62 schools were affected by ransomware in the US last year. At least half suffered a data breach. Data theft – a common situation before hackers encrypt systems in order to force victims to pay multimillion-dollar ransoms under the pretext of making them public.