Nearly twenty schools were able to determine the final grades of exam students later than planned because the software they use to do so was down due to a cyber attack. The problems have now been resolved. “But it was very stressful.”
From 08:00 this morning, schools that are affiliated with a pupil tracking system were able to calculate the results because the standard was known from that moment on. One of the companies that provides this software for two hundred educational institutions (four hundred schools) is Somtoday.
When during the morning updates had to be installed in the software due to a stuck task, the cybercriminals struck and staged a “very large DDoS attack”, according to a spokesperson. With a DDoS attack, a company or organization attacks the capacity of online services or the supporting servers and network equipment. The result is that services are temporarily unavailable.
Calculate manually
More than 85 percent of the results had already been processed at that time, but a large part still had to be done at eighteen schools. An unknown number of schools also had some loose, small tasks open. Somtoday has kept the schools informed of the state of affairs with two messages.
At Eijkhagen College in Landgraaf, the problems resulted in a hectic morning, says deputy director Margret Hacking. When it became clear that the results could not be printed, teachers started calculating themselves. “We have the standards, so we started manually. Until the signal was given that the results were still coming in.” That was a little after 9:30 am.
Parents and students were kept informed in the meantime. This also caused extra stress for them. “Because we didn’t know when we would get the results now,” says exam candidate Dionne, who was still waiting for the redeeming phone call at 3 p.m. “And it certainly didn’t help to relax.”
‘Flying speed’
The software is now running again, confirms the Somtoday spokesperson. The company has blocked everyone outside the Netherlands. Visitors also had to confirm that they are human. This stopped the attack, but it did delay it. Then the final reports for schools were drawn up ‘with flying speed’. As a result, some students may be called a little later than expected. “We find it incredibly sour that students have to wait, I understand how annoying that can feel.”
Parents of some schools received the message that the results will be shared late in the afternoon, after 5 p.m. At Eijkhagen, the teachers managed to call on time. Hacking: ,, It has generated high tension, but now the havo group is the last to be called. In retrospect, we are also very proud that we were able to stay within the schedule.”
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