Associated Press
Miami-Dade County Public Schools was still under siege Wednesday by cyberattacks that began Monday as students returned to school remotely due to the coronavirus pandemic.
There also was a software glitch being blamed for the school district’s problems in getting virtual education going this week.
Miami-Dade County Public Schools Superintendent Alberto Carvalho said in a tweet on Wednesday morning that multiple attempts to disrupt online education have been made Wednesday morning, following two previous days of cyberattacks. Carvalho said they haven’t managed to penetrate the district’s servers.
He said the district’s security and safeguard measures have been successful so far and that the 200,000 students who’ve logged onto the system have been asked to remain logged on.
The remaining teachers and students who have not been able to access the system are being asked to use an alternate method of logging in. Miami-Dade’s public school system is the nation’s fourth largest, with 345,000 students, 392 schools and more than 40,000 employees.
The delayed start to the school year also was marred by a software glitch that blocked access to the district’s servers, Carvalho said during a news conference on Tuesday. That glitch has been resolved, he said.
The FBI and Secret Service have been called in to probe the cyberattacks. They subpoenaed the school district’s internet provider.
Carvalho said they don’t yet know who’s responsible but he wants them prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
On Tuesday Carvalho said during the news conference that the district suffered a distributed denial of service attack Monday morning as a software glitch blocked access to the district’s servers, the Miami Herald reported. The glitch and DDoS attack rendered multiple online school district features useless and teaching nearly impossible.
He had announced on July 30 that the district would start the year online, and late, on August 31.
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Republished with permission from The Associated Press.
