At least four schools in Calgary and possibly several others across Canada have had images of children stolen after hackers attacked a school directory company, leading some to fear the worst. Parents.
“There are a lot of nasty things someone could potentially do with these photos,” Dr. University of Calgary cybersecurity expert Ryan Henry on Global News on Wednesday.
On Sunday, an email from the Calgary School Board (CBE) shocked several parents who would have been informed of a computer breach at a third party responsible for compiling students' school rosters. ¨ves, would have allowed computer hackers to get photos of multiple children.
At least 160 images from four Calgary schools were accessed without permission by the thugs, but the damage could be even greater since Canadian company Edge Imaging does business with nearly 3,000 schools in the country, according to English-language media.
But according to Edge Imaging, it had nothing to do with the hacker attack, which only took place on the servers of the Entourage platform, another company that, in turn, provides services to the directory creator.
“We want to make it clear that at no time were Edge Imaging’s computer systems accessed or compromised. “This incident is solely due to an attack on the Entourage platform,” emphasized the President and CEO, specifying that the affected files were affected. “Subject to “surveillance on the dark web”.
Without disclosing the number of schools affected, the CEO added that the affected institutions had been contacted, according to Global News.
“It really scares me because people just assume that the 'dark web' means bad things.” “You just don't know what someone is going to do with a picture of a child,” lamented Kristen Gobeil, mother of a little girl from one of the four affected schools, in the English-language media.
For his part, the cybersecurity professor urged parents to think twice before giving their permission to a third party to manage their children's data.
According to him, those “who engage in this type of behavior” often have “more vivid imaginations than you or me” and can use the photos to do “shocking things that you would never expect,” he told Global News.
“There’s not much you can do after that,” added the cybersecurity expert.