University of North Florida gets breached again, data on 23K students at risk

For the second time in two years, hackers gained access to a University of North Florida (UNF) server holding the confidential information of students.

How many victims? 23,246.

What type of personal information? Names and Social Security numbers of people who submitted a housing contract between 1997 and the spring of 2011.

What happened? Hackers were able to access a database containing the information, though it is not clear how. School officials are unsure if any of the data was copied.

What was the response? The school is offering one year of free credit monitoring to affected individuals.

Details: This is the second breach to impact the university in two years. In September 2010, an unauthorized individual outside of the United States gained access to a school computer server. A sensitive file on the server contained the personal information of nearly 107,000 UNF students and others who have expressed interest in the college. The information was collected during the recruitment and application process.

Source: firstcoastnews.com, First Coast News, "UNF housing server data breach may affect 23,246 individuals," June 11, 2012.