Memorial University Investigates Security Breach

As I've mentioned before, college students have plenty reasons to be concerned about identity theft. Applications for admissions, scholarships, honors programs, and financial aid require a wealth of personal identifying information that needs to be protected. And the students trust that their information will not be mishandled or compromised. However, that is not necessarily the case. Some students (and possibly former students) at Memorial University found their information was not as secure as they thought.

Memorial University is now having nearly 50,000 computer files checked after a student discovered a security breach that exposed financial information that dated back over 4 years. The problem was discovered when someone working in a password-protected portion of the student aid application site found that changing characters in the URL gave access to someone else's data. While the student raised alarm regarding the issue right away, the university fears that the vulnerability was noticed earlier and exploited. The security breach has been fixed, but they believe that the personal information of at least 90 people was accessed by an unauthorized party. An investigation is underway.

This was obviously carelessness in the design of the website. While the problem has been remedied, it may be too late for some since their information has already been compromised. Those who believe their information may have been taken should take the necessary precautions for those who think they may be victims of identity theft, such as carefully reviewing bank and credit card statement for fraudulent charges.