<div dir="ltr"><p><a href="http://www.ketv.com/article/unl-security-breach-puts-thousands-of-current-former-students-information-at-risk/8522433">http://www.ketv.com/article/unl-security-breach-puts-thousands-of-current-former-students-information-at-risk/8522433</a><br></p><p>University of Nebraska-Lincoln officials emailed students Tuesday to warn them of a security breach.</p><div class="gmail-article-content--body-wrapper-side-floater">
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<p>The names, ID numbers and grades of 30,000 current and former
students may have been comprised over the last two years, the email
read.</p><p>UNL officials said it discovered unauthorized access of a server that ran a math placement exam.</p><p>You can read the email in full below: </p><p>"At some point in the last two years you participated in the Math Placement Exam at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.</p><p>"UNL
officials recently learned of a security breach involving the server
that runs this placement exam. Among the items stored on this server
were NU IDs, grades for placement exams, and names of participants. </p><p>"The
University‘s investigation found that there was unauthorized external
access to information on this server including possible access to files
containing both names and NU IDs. We immediately shut down the server
and have since moved the Math Placement exam to a secure platform. </p><p>We
are notifying you because you are one of the people whose name, NU ID
number, and grades for placement exams were stored in a data file on
this server. Currently, we have no evidence that anyone has used this
information for illegal or malicious activity. We are sending you this
notification as a courtesy, and encourage you to monitor systems for
which you use your NU ID for access. We have no reason to believe that
these other systems have been compromised, as we have duplicate
safeguards protecting them. As a precaution, the MyRed system will
automatically reset your account and a temporary password will be sent
to your email account. Please login to MyRed using this temporary
password and then reset your password accordingly.</p><p>"We are sorry
that your personal information may have been subject to unauthorized
access and we have taken measures to ensure that this situation is not
repeated. The University of Nebraska-Lincoln is committed to maintaining
the privacy of personal information and takes many precautions to
monitor and safeguard the security of its computers and personal
information. If you have further questions about this process or about
the incident, you can contact Alecia Kimbrough, Assistant Dean in the
College of Arts and Sciences, at 402-472-2891 or <a href="mailto:akimbrough@unl.edu">akimbrough@unl.edu</a>. We apologize for any inconvenience this may present to you."</p><p>The folllowing additional points were made by UNL spokesperson Steve Smith: </p><p>These are additional points from UNL spokesperson Steve Smith:</p><p>— The breach was limited to one server and was found during a routine scan during a system update. </p><p>— There were several thousand letters sent out to students regarding this event. </p><p>— No extensive personal information was on the server in question. </p><p>—
An NUID, or Nebraska Unique Identification, is a unique 8-digit number
assigned to students, faculty and staff members during either admissions
or hiring. </p><p>— There is no evidence to think this information has been used for illegal or malicious activity. </p><p>— We’ve taken steps to address the situation. </p><p>—
Though this can be classified as a relatively minor risk, we are taking
the appropriate precautions. We also have asked letter recipients to
monitor systems for which they use their NU ID for access and to reset
their MyRed passwords as an extra precaution.</p></div>