https://triblive.com/local/valley-news-dispatch/butler-county-community-college-to-resume-classes-reopen-campuses-monday-following-ransomware-attack/
Butler County Community College to resume classes, reopen campuses Monday after ransomware attack
Butler County Community College will resume classes and reopen its campuses Monday, Dec.6.
College officials made the announcement Tuesday evening.
Both fall semester credit and noncredit classes were brought to a standstill and the campus closed as a result of a ransomware attack.
The main campus in Butler Township and additional locations in Cranberry, Lawrence, Jefferson and Mercer counties and remote and online classes closed Monday and will remain so through the week.
The college is working to restore databases, servers, hard drives and other devices.
A regional cybersecurity firm is working with BC3 to restore information lost in the breach.
College officials said classes will resume in remote and online formats.
Finals moved back, assignments adjusted
BC3 also moved its finals week to Dec. 13-18 with final examinations to be done in the courses’ previously scheduled format.
Officials also announced on its news.bc3.edu website that it would work with students to adjust assignments and deadlines as necessary for their courses, and that students would not be penalized for delays caused by the situation.
The college enrolls more than 1,900 full-time and 1,600 part-time students.
In October, BC3 scheduled its last week of fall semester classes — Nov. 29 to Dec. 4 — to be online only, as a part of covid mitigation efforts.
Federal authorities said they have seen a spike in cyberattacks this year.
According to the FBI, during the first six months of this year the number of ransomware attacks increased by 62% over 2020 and resulted in $16.8 million in losses for those targeted.
“There’s a lot of jargon used to describe what these attacks are, but they are really nothing more than old-school extortion schemes,” said Jason Killmeyer, a Pittsburgh-based national security expert specializing in emerging technology applications, described the attacks as “nothing more than old-school extortion schemes.”
He said hackers typically lock access to a computer system’s files and demand a ransom be paid in the form of untraceable cryptocurrency in exchange for a “key” to unlock the files.
It is critical for organizations to keep their computer security software up to date, said Killmeyer.
He also encouraged employees and other computer users to be vigilant and not fall for scam emails — known as “phishing” — that try to trick people into giving hackers access to the system.
Such emails may look like legitimate messages from a bank or other businesses and ask for log-in information.
????BC3 UPDATE????***Ongoing IT Situation***All BC3 locations will remain closed this week & will reopen Dec. 6. See https://t.co/vfhksnViOe.— BC3 (@bc3edu) November 30, 2021
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