On May 1, Bartlesville Public Schools in Oklahoma was hit by a significant network security breach that affected its operations. The attack caused many of the district’s computer systems to become inoperable, leading to the cancellation of state testing across all schools in the district. While phones, life safety systems, and Chromebooks connected to hotspots remained functional, the outage severely disrupted the school day. Teachers and administrators had to adjust quickly to the technical issues, and the district is currently working to resolve the situation.
Granger Meador, the executive director of technology and communications for Bartlesville Public Schools, confirmed that the breach had impacted numerous computer systems. After detecting the security incident, the district immediately engaged external cybersecurity professionals to investigate the scope of the attack and work on restoring the affected systems. The investigation is still ongoing, with officials hoping to fully assess the damage and the possibility of sensitive data being compromised.
Due to the disruption, state testing, which was scheduled for the day, had to be canceled. The district plans to reschedule the testing as soon as the systems are back online. At least one school, Wayside School, informed parents about delays in student dismissal due to the outage, asking for patience as they navigated the situation. Although the systems were down, the district tried to maintain as much normalcy as possible, with classroom instruction continuing where feasible.
As of now, there are no confirmed reports of sensitive data being compromised in the attack. The district has not provided a timeline for when the systems will be fully restored. The situation is still under investigation, and the school district has pledged to provide updates as the investigation progresses and more information becomes available.
Reference:
