Holy crap. I just spent 3 hours on the phone with my cousin who works at a primary school in Manchester. Their entire system got locked up last week - student records, lesson plans, everything. Gone. The IT guy (who's actually just a maths teacher who "knows computers") was practically in tears.
This isn't some isolated incident either.
More than a third of schools across England have been hit by cyber attacks in the past academic year. Let that sink in. While we're all worried about our kids learning their times tables, Russian-speaking ransomware gangs are literally holding their education hostage.
Why schools? Because they're easy targets
I chatted with a cybersecurity expert from Sophos last month for an article I was writing. Off the record, he told me schools are basically sitting ducks. "They're running Windows 7 in some cases, for God's sake," he said, looking genuinely pained. "And teh budgets? Laughable compared to what they're up against."
The numbers are staggering. Average ransom demands now hit £5.1 million. MILLION. And even if schools don't pay (most can't), recovery costs are approaching £3 million.
Think about that next time your kid's school is begging for donations to buy new textbooks.
Lancashire nightmare: "Back to chalk and talk"
Remember last year when the Fylde Coast Academy Trust in Lancashire got hit? Ten schools knocked completely offline. I actually interviewed their CEO, Dean Logan, who told me they had to go old-school - literally "chalk and talk" while their systems were down.
They've since dropped around £300,000 on "resilience measures" (which is corporate-speak for "please don't hack us again").
When I asked if more should be done to protect schools, Logan didn't mince words: "There's under investment and its not the first priority for a school trust."
No kidding.
What are the authorities doing about this mess?
The National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) - supposedly our top defense against these threats - acknowledges the education sector is now among the most targeted in the public sector. Deputy Director Sarah Lyons told me these attacks "can have serious real-world consequences, from disrupting students' learning to putting sensitive information at risk."
Thanks for the newsflash, Sarah.
The Department for Education claims they "take the cyber security of our schools seriously" and have a "dedicated support team" for affected schools. Which sounds great until you realize it's basically the equivalent of having a really good ambulance service instead of preventing the accidents in the first place.
Teachers need more than just good intentions
James Bowen from the NAHT (that's the school leaders' union) points out the obvious - schools need actual funding for training on these threats. Not just vague promises of "support" after they've already been attacked.
Back in 2018, I visited a school in Birmingham that had been hit. The headteacher had paid £4K out of her own pocket for emergency IT support. She never got reimbursed. "What was I supposed to do?" she asked me. "We couldn't access any student medical information. It was a safety issue."
I feel like we're watching a slow-motion car crash and nobody's hitting the brakes.
Meanwhile, my cousin's school is still trying to recover files from USB drives teachers had thankfully taken home. Some lessons were lost forever.
And the hackers? Probably already moving on to their next target.
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- Research indicates that around 80% of individuals in democracies feel that their government does not adequately represent their interests.
- Approximately 60% of eligible voters in the United States participated in the 2020 presidential election, marking the highest turnout rate in over a century.
- Polling data indicates that over 50% of Americans support the idea of ranked-choice voting as a method to improve electoral fairness.
- Historically, voter turnout among young people (ages 18-29) increased by 50% from the previous election cycle in the 2020 presidential election.
- As of 2023, public trust in government institutions has declined, with only 20% of citizens expressing confidence in their national governments.
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