Matthew Lane, a 19-year-old college student, is set to plead guilty after being accused of executing a massive cyber attack against PowerSchool, affecting millions of students and teachers. The Department of Justice detailed serious allegations, including cyber extortion and identity theft, stemming from a breach that involved unapproved access to sensitive data. Following the breach, PowerSchool faced threats of public disclosure after it paid a ransom of $2.85 million to protect the stolen information, yet risks persisted on the safety of the data.
Though the DOJ doesn't identify PowerSchool by name, the details outlined by the DOJ line up with the attack, such as the hacker's threat to leak the names, email addresses, phone numbers, Social Security numbers, dates of birth, and medical information of tens of millions of students and teachers if the company didn't pay a $2.85 million ransom.
In January, PowerSchool said it became aware of a data breach involving the 'unauthorized exfiltration of certain personal information' from its customer support portal, PowerSource.
However, PowerSchool customers later received additional threats to expose stolen data. 'As is always the case with these situations, there was a risk that the bad actors would not delete the data they stole, despite assurances and evidence that were provided to us,' PowerSchool said.
The Department of Justice said Matthew Lane of Massachusetts agreed to plead guilty to four counts, including cyber extortion, unauthorized access to protected computers, and aggravated identity theft.
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