Eastern Illinois University admits to data breach

2009-12-07

Eastern Illinois University has admitted to a possible data breach and has responded by sending notification letters to around 9,000 former, prospective and current undergraduate students.

The employees of Eastern's Information Technology Services Department found that a server used by the university's Office of Admissions had been infected with a number of viruses.

A number of these would let an outside person to access the server, the institution said, and the IT intrusion may have affected personal data.

Investigators currently cannot tell whether any files with student data were actually accessed.

The notification letters have been sent to those whose data was on the server and contain safety advice that people can take.

Meanwhile, the investigation into the data breach continues.

The University of East Anglia's Climatic Research Unit was also recently on the wrong end of a data breach.

Information from the establishment was published on a number of websites.

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