Students’ personal information may have been accessed in PowerSchool data breach: CBE

A Calgary Board of Education sign is seen in this undated image. (File)

The Calgary Board of Education (CBE) says personal student information, such as addresses, dates of birth and medical information, was accessed during a software breach last month.

In a letter to parents on Wednesday, the CBE released more information about its investigation into the PowerSchool data breach.

The school board was informed of a cybersecurity incident affecting PowerSchool, a cloud-based software that helps schools manage student information, on Jan. 7.

The breach affected many school boards across Canada and the United States.

The CBE confirmed the types of personal information that may have been accessed or acquired by an unauthorized user, which include:

-First, middle and last names;

-Home address;

-Phone numbers;

-Date of birth;

-Gender;

-Grades;

-CBE issued email address;

-Alberta student ID number;

-CBE issued ID number;

-Medical information;

-Alberta Health Care number; and

-Doctor contact information.

The CBE said the breach affected current and former students who were a part of the system since September 2018. However, historical data was transferred to PowerSchool at launch, so students who were a part of the CBE before September 2018 may also have been affected.

“PowerSchool has reported that it does not expect the compromised data to be shared or made public,” the CBE said in the letter.

“Additionally, PowerSchool believes the data has been deleted without any further replication or dissemination.”

Information like financial or banking information, birth certificates, drivers’ licences, immigration documents and police information check letters, which are not stored in PowerSchool, was not impacted.

Parents and students can visit the CBE website for more information on the breach, or to access credit monitoring and identity protection being offered by PowerSchool.