Los Angeles School District suffered a widespread cyber-attack

The Los Angeles Unified School District suffered a widespread cyber-attack on Saturday. Computer systems were affected and more than 400,000 students' data could have been compromised by tech criminals. Officials are uncertain whether hackers were able to access assessment data, grades, class schedules, disciplinary records and disability reports through the district's online student management system.

On Tuesday, the school day had to be delayed due to the cyber attack. Authorities asked around 70,000 employees to reset their passwords.

"We have seen no evidence of health information being accessed or of students' social security numbers being accessed," the superintendent of the Los Angeles Unified School District, Alberto Carvalho, and explained that the payroll system is also functioning correctly, and personnel's data does not appear to have been compromised.

The Los Angeles Unified School District is the largest in California and the second largest in the country.

"We are still going through the student files because the student management system was touched,"Carvalho said at a downtown press conference, accompanied by Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti and Los Angeles Police Chief Michel Moore. He added that hackers have encryption skills to cover their tracks and "exclude us from what they have or what they saw."

Carvalho explained that the attack was discovered on Saturday at 10:30 p.m. and was executed by a "ransomware (data hijacking) tool that temporarily disabled systems, froze others and gained access to some degree of data."

In addition to taking the district's website offline, the hackers' action caused students to lose e-mail access and disabled systems that allow teachers to post lessons.

Attack from a foreign country

There are suspicions that the hack may have originated in a foreign country although Alberto Carvalho reported that there has been no ransom demand from the hackers.

"I'm not going to go into a lot of detail, but there are three nations that investigators have tracked. But that doesn't necessarily indicate that's where the attack came from," Carvalho said.

The FBI and the Department of Homeland Security are assisting local law enforcement agencies in investigating the cyberattack.

The superintendent's office issued a statement to reassure the community.

"The decision to resume classes and work was informed by the district's ability to confirm that our most critical systems were viable. Our student information systems were back up and running within the first two hours of the school day. In addition, students were safely bused to school, received nutritious meals, and learning continued in the classrooms."