Cape Breton, P.E.I. school districts victims of global cybersecurity breach

Data breach impacts Maritime schools Schools in Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island are impacted by the PowerSchool data breach.

The Cape Breton-Victoria Regional Centre for Education in Nova Scotia has fallen victim to a global cybersecurity breach.

The Nova Scotia government says it learned Wednesday that the personal information of some staff, as well as current and former students, in the school district was stolen as part of a global cybersecurity breach of PowerSchool.

PowerSchool is a widely-used information system that tracks enrolment, attendance and grades. It contains personal information such birth dates, addresses, and MSI cards, but the province says it doesn’t include financial data like credit card information.

The province says it is working with the vendor to determine the extent of the breach. Although the full impact is not yet clear, the province doesn’t believe the PowerSchool system in any other centre for education has been affected.

“We take this incident very seriously,” said Education and Early Childhood Development Minister Brendan Maguire in the release. “We are sharing information with families and affected staff and will continue to update them as we know more.”

PowerSchool says the breach is contained.

The province, which also alerted the office of the information and privacy commissioner, is conducting its own investigation.

PowerSchool contains information about 135,000 public school students across Nova Scotia.

The Cape Breton-Victoria Regional Centre for Education has more than 3,000 staff and more than 13,250 students.

Possible P.E.I. breach

The Prince Edward Island government says the personal data of past and present students, teachers, parents, guardians and administrators may have been compromised in the global breach.

"The Province has been in direct communications with PowerSchool to better understand the scope of the incident and to identify who has been impacted on Prince Edward Island," a government news release says. "All identified individuals will receive further information in the coming weeks."

For more Nova Scotia news visit our dedicated provincial page.