Cyberattack hits Canvas system; thousands of schools impacted

Canvas, a school learning platform, has reportedly been hacked and is experiencing outages. It's causing problems for thousands of universities nationwide, including UW-Milwaukee and UW-Madison. 

Canvas cyberattack

What we know:

According to DownDetector, Canvas by Instructure is a learning management system (LMS) that supports online course organization, assignments, grading, video conferencing, and a range of educational tools for schools and universities.

DownDetector said users began reporting issues with Canvas on Thursday afternoon.

The hacking group named ShinyHunters claimed responsibility for the breach at Canvas. The hacking group posted online that nearly 9,000 schools worldwide were affected.

Universities and school districts quickly began notifying students and parents.

A student from UW-Milwaukee told FOX6 that university leaders sent an email saying Canvas would be disabled temporarily. 

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UW-Madison put out a campus alert telling students multiple teams are working on the issue. 

"At around 3 p.m. today, UW–Madison became aware we are part of a nationwide Canvas outage. We recognize this is occurring at a very challenging time during final exams and grading, and we’re committed to providing you with support and flexibility as we navigate this significant disruption. Multiple teams are working to address this issue.

IMPORTANT: If Canvas prompts you to perform any action — such as clicking a link, logging in, resetting your password, or completing any tasks — do not proceed. These prompts may not be legitimate.

If you have an upcoming final exam or any outstanding assignments that require Canvas access, please watch for communication from your instructor and reach out if you need clarification.

We will share additional information about final exams and grading as we learn more. See the Campus Alerts page for ongoing updates."

Related

Canvas reportedly hacked by ShinyHunters, claiming data breach

Canvas, a widely used learning management system by Instructure, experienced outages Thursday afternoon.

The Source: The information in this post was provided by the Associated Press, DownDetector, and an official statement posted by UW-Madison.

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