Cyber attack on UvA and HvA: ‘acute threat has been averted’

Cyber attack on UvA and HvA: ‘acute threat has been averted’

The Hogeschool van Amsterdam (HvA) and the University of Amsterdam (UvA) have successfully averted the recent cyber attack on their networks, the institutions report. The hack did not result in any system downtime, data being held hostage or a ransom demand.

The attack was detected in time by the security operations centre last month, reports the UvA on its website. Immediate measures were taken and a forensic investigation was launched.

Report

Apparently, that was just in time. “In a short space of time, the hackers had infected over fifty of the more than one thousand servers at the UvA and the HvA and provided them with options to encrypt them at a later date,” writes the UvA. “The servers are now all clean, so the acute threat has been averted.”

Both institutions have reported the matter to the police and to the personal data authority (Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens). The police investigation is still ongoing. In the coming period, there will also be an evaluation of how the UvA and HvA dealt with the hack. The lessons learned will be shared with other higher education institutions, just as happened last year after the major cyber attack on Maastricht University. (HOP, Evelien Flink)