Sierra College victim of ransomware attack

Sierra College was the victim of a ransomware attack Thursday morning that left students unable to submit final assignments and teachers unable to work on posting final grades before Friday's end of the semester. "We are currently experiencing technical difficulties on the Sierra College website and some other online systems," Sierra College spokesperson Josh Morgan said. "This is the result of an external ransomware attack on our systems." According to Morgan, law enforcement have been called in along with a third-party cybersecurity forensic consultant to investigate how the ransomware attack occurred. Communication studies instructor Joan Merriam said that a work-around was created to allow students and teachers to access Canvas, the school learning management system. Merriam said that teachers were provided with a temporary password and website to access Canvas that allowed them to not have to go through the main Sierra College website. However, by Thursday afternoon, another server crash shut down the work-around and "we were all dead in the water," Merriam said. Canvas was running again by 8 p.m. Thursday, according to Merriam. "In speaking with my colleagues, most if not all students and instructors are able to get into Canvas with the temporary login, but because of the lost time just two days before the end of the term, some instructors are having to extend their assignment and/or final exam due-dates beyond midnight tonight, which is the official end of the semester," Merriam said. The school's main website is still down, but an information page has been provided with emails and phone numbers for essential departments and also a frequently-asked- questions section for students. According to the website, final grades will be posted on May 28 and transcripts for students will be made available a few weeks after final grades are posted. Those who have yet to pay for their classes for the upcoming summer and fall semesters will not be dropped from their classes as the school turned off the payment portal while the website is being fixed. "The last communication from the college indicated that they don't have a timeline for that system's restoration, but the outage is likely to continue at least through the weekend," Merriam said. Morgan said that rectifying this issue is a top priority of the schools along with keeping their students' and staff's data safe. "We also want everyone to know that we are working diligently to restore operations," Morgan said. "Both restoring operations and our investigation are ongoing. We will provide an additional update once our investigation is complete."