Back in November, we found reports circulating about a data breach at the University of Florida affecting over 300,000 records at the College of Dentistry. We are now seeing yet another breach involving a little over 97,000 people. This breach is part of a wave of intrusions reported by the University over the past year or so and names and social security numbers are involved. It is unknown whether the hacker accessed this personal data or not, but the system was compromised.
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Texas A&M University seems to be having frequent problems with their computer system suffering security breaches. It is reported that for the fourth time in two years, the university has exposed social security numbers of current and former students.

One of their students did an internet search on the university web site and found information that included applicants who were admitted to the university in 2005. The information found included the social security number of the student who initiated the search.

The web site was shut down temporarily so the document could be removed.

“We take this very seriously and it is always disappointing when something like this happens,” A&M-Corpus Christi President Flavius Killebrew said Friday.

The university Executive Vice President of Finance and Administration advised that letters of all individuals affected were to be mailed out this past Monday. The time frame involved is not currently known and authorities are working to figure out how long the information was able to be viewed on the internet.

This is the most recent incident reported by the university. An earlier occurrence took place in September 2008 when a computer server was illegally accessed by an outside hacker, also exposing records that included student social security numbers.

A flash drive containing social security numbers of students was misplaced back in June of 2007 and to wrap up the list, a class roster of 49 students’ was misplaced that contained social security numbers. The use of social security numbers as identifiers was discontinued in the fall of 2007.

A university employee will be reprimanded for the availability of such numbers in the most recent incident. These were to be wiped off of the server’s archives.

Many colleges and universities nationwide have been found to have either leaked private information or had their computer hacked. Some have found to have this information leaked via the internet, such as the following incident:
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Over 9,000 people are at risk of having had their personal information, including social security number, exposed. In July of 2008, someone attempted to hack into the campus’ network, exposing thousands of records. Those affected include students, faculty and staff.

The university’s vice president and chief information officer has apologized for the incident and has assured those involved that they have not yet found any evidence of the data being misused or acquired by another party during the exposure. They will be looking to inform all who might be at risk.

This has not been the first attempt at stealing data from their network. This also happened back in 2006 and affected the personal information of upwards of 35,000.