Ransomware attack affects thousands of school websites globally

Hackers have attacked an education technology company, Finalsite, shutting down thousands of school websites and nearly 5,000 alone in the US.

"We remain committed to restoration, as quickly and safely as possible. Our team is actively monitoring performance and security across our infrastructure, and we will continue to work through the night and weekend until every site is back online," the company said.

Earlier this week, at least 8,000 schools globally, hosted by Finalsite, discovered that they were facing availability issues or displayed errors. Finalsite provides school districts with website design, hosting and content management solutions.

Finalsite provides school districts with website design, hosting and content management solutions. The company said that they continue to restore more websites and core functionality every hour. “We immediately took steps to secure our systems and to contain the activity. We quickly launched an investigation into the event with the assistance of third-party forensic specialists, and began proactively taking certain systems offline.”