Apple now requires Education Store shoppers in the U.S. and several other countries to verify their student, educator, parent, or homeschool-teacher status through UNiDAYS, ending the previous honor-system approach. 9to5Mac reports: Starting today, Apple requires shoppers in the United States to complete verification when making a purchase via the Education Store. This change also applies to Australia, Hong Kong, Turkey, Canada, and Chile. In many other markets around the world, such as the UK, Apple already required verification. As a refresher, people eligible for Apple's Education Store include current and newly accepted college students and their parents, as well as faculty, staff, and homeschool teachers across all grade levels. Apple is teaming up with UNiDAYS to handle the verification process. Students and educators will be asked to create a UNiDAYS ID and then verify their academic status by logging in to their school's academic portal. Alternatively, users can upload a photo of their student or faculty IDs. Homeschool teachers, meanwhile, will need to provide an identity document such as a driver's license, state ID card, or passport. They'll also need to provide one homeschool document, such as a Letter of Intent (LOI) or Letter of Acknowledgment. Most customers will be verified instantly, and those requiring manual verification should hear back within 24 hours. The same verification process applies both in-store and online for Apple Education Store shoppers. Meanwhile, Apple has added Apple Watch to the Education Store for the first time, offering discounts on the Series 11, SE 3, and Ultra 3.

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Tens of thousands of students studying for final exams around the world have regained access to a key online learning system after a cyberattack had earlier knocked it offline.

The post Canvas System Is Online After a Cyberattack Disrupted Thousands of Schools appeared first on SecurityWeek.

America's school districts "spent billions on technology during the pandemic," reports the Washington Post. "But now some states are limiting in-school screen time because of concerns about its impact on children." Nationwide [U.S.] schools invested at least $15 billion and possibly as much as $35 billion from federal pandemic relief funds on laptops, learning software and other technology between 2020 and 2024, according to an estimate by the Edunomics Lab, an education think tank. By last school year, 88% of public schools reported in a federal survey they had given every child a laptop, tablet or similar device. Now, some states and school districts are walking back their technology use following pressure from parents who claim too much in-school screen time has zapped children's attention spans and left them worse off academically. At least a dozen states introduced or adopted policies this year that attempt to regulate screen time in schools — from prescribing limits to allowing families to opt out of virtual instruction... In Missouri, a bill would require every school district in that state to come up with a screen time policy is making its way through the state legislature. "Ed tech is just big tech in a sweater vest," said Missouri state Rep. Tricia Byrnes (R), who introduced the legislation and blames what she described as the overuse of technology for middling test scores... Complicating the issue is research that shows students do not see any academic gains when provided with laptops. A meta-analysis of studies on reading comprehension suggests paper-based texts are better than digital-based reading... A body of research has established that excessive or unstructured screen time can have detrimental effects on children, including harming language development, weakening social skills and triggering anxiety and depression. But the effects of school-issued devices and in-school usage on children's development are less understood, said Tiffany Munzer, a developmental behavioral pediatrician and digital media researcher at the University of Michigan. Some studies report that high-quality digital tools can support students' learning goals, Munzer said. But "a lot of the apps that are marketed as educational ... are not actually educational and contain a lot of commercialized content."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The Senate’s top Democrat called on the Department of Homeland Security Friday to work closely with state and local governments to defend against artificial intelligence-strengthened hacks. 

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., wrote to DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin to make sure state, local, tribal and territorial (SLTT) governments aren’t left behind as AI models advance, posing new hacking threats.

“There is a race between cybersecurity defenders and AI-enabled hacking — and there’s no time to waste,” Schumer wrote.

“While the White House has reportedly begun hosting meetings about its internal security priorities following these frontier AI cyber breakthroughs, it is glaringly obvious that the Department of Homeland Security needs an updated plan for coordinating these efforts with [state, local, tribal and territorial] governments and implementing procedures to reduce the risk of disruptive cyberattacks enabled by frontier AI,” he stated.

Schumer said he was worried about the capabilities of DHS and its Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency to carry out that coordination, given federal funding cuts to the Multistate Information Sharing and Analysis Center, and the lack of a Senate-confirmed CISA director for the duration of the second Trump administration.

Schumer wants a plan from DHS by July 1 on coordinating with state and local governments on a range of questions, such as how to identify top AI talent, carry out rapid patching and conduct risk assessments.

“AI is changing the cyber battlefield fast — and we cannot let hackers get there first,” Schumer said in comments accompanying the letter. “Hospitals, power grids, water systems, schools, elections, and emergency services cannot be left exposed while criminal gangs and state-backed hackers race to exploit new AI tools. DHS must immediately help states and localities find and fix vulnerabilities before Americans are hit with outages, disruptions, and attacks that could put lives and livelihoods at risk.”

CISA is using AI to help on the defensive side internally, agency officials recently said.

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A system that thousands of schools and universities use went offline due to a cyberattack, creating chaos as students tried to study for finals.

The post Cyberattack Hits Canvas System Used by Thousands of Schools as Finals Loom appeared first on SecurityWeek.

The Trump administration is redirecting a cybersecurity scholarship program that requires recipients to work in government service toward artificial intelligence, leaving some current program scholars dismayed and bewildered.

In an email to participating school program coordinators obtained by CyberScoop, the Office of Personnel Management and National Science Foundation said the CyberCorps Scholarship For Service program would now be known as CyberAI SFS.

“The SFS students we enroll today will not be employable when they graduate in 2-3 years without significant AI background,” the email reads. “Any SFS student in this new program must be proficient in using AI in cybersecurity or providing security and resilience for AI systems. Therefore, new students in the legacy CyberCorps program must learn to acquire AI expertise to augment their cybersecurity expertise.”

“Effective immediately, new SFS scholars will not be accepted to the Legacy CyberCorps(C) program without a description on how they will develop competencies at the intersection of cybersecurity and AI,” the email continues. “The description of the competency development could include, but are not limited to, formal program of study, experimental learning, research activities, capstone projects, competitions, certifications, and/or no-credit professional development via external providers.”

One current program scholar graduating soon said they were “disappointed” by the change for several reasons. As of earlier this week, the agencies collectively running the program — OPM, NSF and the Department of Homeland Security — hadn’t notified any program participants that any changes were on the horizon.

For another: “I was a little bit surprised that it was coming out as so blatantly disregarding the people that haven’t graduated yet, that everyone in my cohort is already considered ‘legacy,’ and the fact that it said people in the program that I’m currently in will not be employable in the coming years,” they said.

The email leaves scholars uncertain about what will happen as they try to fulfill their side of the agreement, especially since doing so has  already been difficult amid cyber job cutbacks and other concerns about how the program has recently been administered. The scholar told CyberScoop there are around 300 people in this current group.

“I assume it will affect placements,” they said. “I can’t say for sure one way or another, because placements are already so impacted by everything that’s been going on. I don’t know what’s due to lack of AI background and what’s due to everything else.”

Another scholar said it was wrong for OPM “to keep claiming repeatedly that they’re acting in our best interests,” when “we’re left out to dry.” Already, the current group of scholars has been frustrated by their inability to get questions answered.

“If we’re legacy CyberCorps, then how does that address anything?” the scholar asked. “We’re just kind of being shoved into a closet and forgotten about. Now in that email, they were saying that we were going to be unhireable in two years time without all this AI stuff under our belt. But at the same time, almost all of our universities were actively discouraging the use of AI.”

Another part of the email brought welcome news to those scholars: a temporary easing of the program’s requirements, including the 70-20-10 rule that sets targets for jobs in the federal government, state and local governments, and the education sector, as well as the rules for securing an internship.. Even so, scholars say they still haven’t received any direct information about the changes.

A spokesperson for NSF said there have been some misunderstandings about the email to school program coordinators (known as principal investigators), but didn’t address current scholars’ concerns about communication.

“The guidance does not require scholars to possess these competencies upon entry,” said the spokesperson, Michael Englund. “Rather, it requires principal investigators (PIs) to clearly describe how their programs will prepare scholars to develop AI-related competencies by the time they graduate (typically within two to three years). In other words, programs must have a concrete and immediate plan to ensure scholars gain these skills during the course of their studies, not prior to admission.”

A spokesperson for OPM addressed the two biggest concerns of current participants.

“There are no changes to placement requirements,” the spokesperson said. “As noted, NSF’s updates are forward-looking to ensure future cohorts are prepared for evolving workforce needs. NSF has encouraged institutions to use professional development funds to expand AI-related training where needed. At OPM, we are also expanding AI training and have introduced AI ambassadors to support adoption.”

On communication: “Principal investigators (PIs) remain the primary point of contact for scholars, but OPM plans to increase direct outreach and plans to issue follow-up communication to scholars on placement efforts,” the spokesperson said.

Last week’s email is the latest turn for the program, with the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency last month declaring that it was canceling summer internships due to the lapse in funding for some DHS agencies. Congress has since provided funding for CISA. 

The agency didn’t answer a question about whether that cancellation decision has been reversed as a result.

The post Trump officials are steering a cybersecurity scholarship program toward AI appeared first on CyberScoop.

Educational tech giant Instructure has confirmed that data was stolen in a cyberattack, with the ShinyHunters extortion gang claiming responsibility. [...]

Hackers disrupted services and stole names, email addresses, student ID numbers, and user messages.

The post Edtech Firm Instructure Discloses Data Breach Amid Hacker Leak Threats appeared first on SecurityWeek.

Tony Isaac shares a report from NPR: Federal survey data shows that the amount of math homework assigned to fourth and eighth grade students, in particular, has been steadily declining for the past decade. Some educators and parents say this is a good thing -- students shouldn't spend six or more hours a day at school and still have additional schoolwork to complete at home. But the research on homework is complicated. Some studies show that students who spend more time on homework perform better than their peers. For example, a longitudinal study released in 2021 of more than 6,000 students in Germany, Uruguay and the Netherlands found that lower-performing students who increased the amount of time they spent on math homework performed better in math, even one year later. Other studies, however, suggest homework has minimal outcomes on academic performance: A 1998 study of more than 700 U.S. students led by a researcher at Duke University found that more homework assigned in elementary grades had no significant effect on standardized test scores. The researchers did find small positive gains on class grades when they looked at both test scores and the proportion of homework students completed. More homework was also associated with negative attitudes about school for younger children in the study. "The best educators figured out a long time ago that we can control what we can control," and that's what happens during the school day, Superintendent Garrett said, not homework. "There has been a shift away from it naturally anyway, and I felt like this made it equitable across our entire school system." "The best argument for homework is that mathematical procedures require practice, and you don't want to waste classroom time on practice, so you send that home," said Tom Loveless, a researcher and former teacher who has studied homework. Ariel Taylor Smith, senior director of the Center for Policy and Action at the National Parents Union, said: "The thing they point to is that it's an equity issue, and not all parents have the same availability and ability to support their students. I would make the argument that if a kid is really far behind in school, that's an equity issue. They need the additional time to practice." Kids, she said, "need more practice ... Sometimes, you do have to practice the boring stuff, like math." "The interesting issue for folks to consider is not should there be more homework, but should there be better homework," said Joyce Epstein, who has studied homework and is the co-director of the Center on School, Family, and Community Partnerships at the Johns Hopkins University School of Education. "Better homework in math might be knowing the fact that kids don't have to be practicing for hours, 10 to 20 examples," when they could establish mastery in less time.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

A bipartisan pair of senators want a company that operates a tip line for anonymously reporting school safety concerns to answer questions about hackers compromising sensitive student information.

Sens. Maggie Hassan, D-N.H., and Jim Banks, R-Ind., announced on Monday they’d sent a letter to the firm, Navigate360, about last month’s incident.

“We write to express significant concern about the risks to students, staff, and schools from a recent cyberattack on your company’s P3 Global Intel tip line,” they said in the April 24 letter. “We are particularly concerned by reports that the cyberattack exploited platform vulnerabilities in order to steal students’ highly sensitive personally identifiable information. We urge you to provide the public clarity regarding what data was stolen, how Navigate360 is responding, and what safeguards Navigate360 will put into place to prevent this from happening again.”

According to the company, more than 30,000 schools and 5,000 public safety agencies use Navigate360’s products. Hackers claimed to purloin 93 gigabytes of data from the firm.

“Your company markets its product as an anonymous tip line,” Hassan and Banks said. “However, the personally identifiable information recently released by the hackers suggests otherwise. This puts the safety of students at risk and undermines public trust in using such platforms to report suspicious activity. Education and school safety experts have expressed concerns that, without guaranteed anonymity, students will choose not to report safety concerns.”

At the time of the alleged breach, Navigate360 CEO JP Guilbault said the company was working to determine if there was an incident and if there was, its extent. He did not confirm that sensitive information was released. The company did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the senators’ letter Monday.

A whopping 82% of K-12 schools said they experienced a cyber incident between July 2023 and December 2024, according to a report from the Center for Internet Security. The scale of cyberattacks on schools expanded during COVID-19. Hackers seeking student information usually have a financial motive, such as holding the information for ransom.

The hackers in the Navigate360 case were apparently motivated by hacktivism.

“Remember folks, don’t do the dirty work for the pigs,” they wrote. “Investigating crime is their job, not yours. They don’t care about you, they want convictions and prisoners to fuel the for-profit prisons.”

Hassan and Banks’ specific questions for Navigate360 included inquiries about its cybersecurity practices, what data was compromised, whether the tip line is fully anonymous and what kind of help the company has provided to school districts.

The post Senators seek answers about hackers obtaining sensitive student data from ostensibly anonymous tip line appeared first on CyberScoop.

The Washington Post reports that some teachers are now implementing "brain breaks" in their classrooms to cope with shorter attention spans, "including limiting screen time; cutting the time students spend on one activity; adding more engaging, hands-on projects; and practicing meditation." Some teachers say the efforts are helping, at least a little... To engage students, teachers say they often feel the need to deliver teaching not only in shorter bursts, but also in more entertaining ways. "The new word is 'edutainment,'" said Curtis Finch, superintendent of Deer Valley Unified School District in Arizona. "How can you make your lesson applicable, interactive? Teachers are going to have to be more engaging for students...." In a kindergarten classroom at McKinley STEAM [a K-8 public school], students start the day with a meditation. The classroom of two dozen children is perhaps its quietest during this short activity every morning. Imagine you're in the Arctic, a voice from a meditation video tells them, with snowflakes melting on your skin. Silently, the children lay down on the carpet and close their eyes for a moment. After the meditation, the students gather in a circle and do a few deep breathing exercises before taking turns proclaiming what they are capable of each day. "I can be a good student," one little boy said before the child next to him replied: "I can listen to the teacher." The goal is that these mantras will stay with the children hours later, when they have to sit through the more tedious lessons of the day. An instructional coach at McKinley STEAM says the strategies are working students aren't reaching for their phones during class and sometimes actually get drawn into lessons. The article also explains why some teachers find this necessary: In recent years, educators say, it has grown more challenging to get students to pay attention. Eighty-eight percent of respondents in an international survey from 2025 of more than 3,000 teachers believed their students' attention spans were getting shorter. In a study published last year about kindergarten through second-grade classrooms in the United States, 75 percent of teachers said attention spans had dropped since the coronavirus pandemic, when the use of laptops and other technology for schooling spread rapidly. A growing body of research says that excessive screen time and short-form content such as TikTok videos are part of the problem. At least 36 states, including Ohio, have laws requiring schools to have some form of a cellphone ban. There is debate over whether screen time reduces people's ability to focus or their desire to — many developmental experts lean toward the latter, suggesting that it is possible to help students regain longer attention spans.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The ShinyHunters extortion group has leaked data from 13.5 million McGraw Hill user accounts, stolen after breaching the company's Salesforce environment earlier this month. [...]

theodp writes: "Gates Computer Science Building renamed Peter Thiel Center for Panoptic Computing" reads the headline of an April Fools' Day story that ran in the Humor section of The Stanford Daily (with the further disclaimer that "This article is purely satirical and fictitious"). The story begins: "Following revelations that the billionaire founder of Microsoft, Bill Gates, had a longstanding relationship with convicted child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, Stanford has announced it will strip Gates' name from the William H. Gates Computer Science Building and instead honor alumnus Peter Thiel B.A. '89, JD '92. Gates, who is not a Stanford alumnus, gave an initial gift of $6 million toward the building's construction in 1992." While fictional, the story does make one wonder what may become of the academic and institutional buildings worldwide named after Bill Gates in the blowback over his past ties to Epstein, which have already played a factor in the breakdown of his marriage to Melinda French Gates and friendship with Warren Buffet. In addition to The Gates Computer Science Building at Stanford, this includes the Bill and Melinda Gates Computer Science Complex at the University of Texas at Austin, Bill and Melinda Gates Hall at Cornell, The Bill & Melinda Gates Center for Computer Science & Engineering at the University of Washington, and The William H. Gates Building at MIT's Stata Center. Buildings named after Gates' parents include Mary Gates Hall and William H. Gates Hall at the University of Washington, and The William Gates Building at the University of Cambridge (UK). Aside from the Thiel angle, The Stanford Daily's April Fools' Day story may not be as far-fetched as it may seem -- many universities' naming policies include provisions allowing donors' names to be removed from buildings, programs, or other facilities under extraordinary circumstances. For example, the University of Washington's Regent Policy No. 50 states, "The University reserves the right to revoke and terminate any naming on reasonable grounds not limited to the revelation of corporate or individual acts detracting from the University's mission, integrity, or reputation." Then again, UW notes that Bill's parents and siblings served as UW Regents for decades, so one expects Bill will be granted some leeway here for what he has characterized as 'foolish' choices on his part.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Infinite Campus, a widely used K-12 student information system, is warning customers of a data breach following an extortion attempt by a threat actor. [...]

An anonymous reader quotes a repot from the Portland Tribune: There was plenty of uncertainty and debate about the effectiveness of a cell phone ban decreed (PDF) by executive order last summer. But at least in Estacada, the policy has earned two thumbs up, including approval from a "grumpy old teacher." Jeff Mellema is a language arts teacher at Estacada High School. He has worked in the building for 24 years, and he said the new policy that prohibits students from using their phones during the day has been a breath of fresh air. "There is so much better discourse in my classroom, be it personal or academic," Mellema said. "Students can't avoid those conversations anymore with their phones." "This ban has brought joy back to this old, grumpy teacher," he added with a smile. That is the kind of feedback Gov. Tina Kotek was hoping for as she visited Estacada High School on Wednesday afternoon, March 18. Her goal was to visit classrooms, speak with administrators, and meet with students one-on-one to hear about the effectiveness of her phone policy. [...] In the classrooms, she was able to take a straw poll around the cell phone ban and then get specific, direct feedback from the kids. Overall, it was positive. The Rangers said they noticed changes in how they interact with teachers and peers. They don't feel that "siren's song" tug of their phones as often, and the changes are bleeding into everyday life as well -- think less reminders to put phones away during family dinners. Phones also led to issues around bullying and online toxicity during the school day. There are some hiccups. The students spoke about difficulties in tracking busy schedules. Many athletes relied on their phones for practice times and locations. Some advanced placement kids said the overzealous programs monitoring school laptops blocked access to needed resources for studying/researching schoolwork. There is even a strange quirk with school-provided tech that prevents them from accessing their calculators. "Maybe the filters are too strong right now," Gov. Kotek said. "That is why we are working with the districts to best implement the policy." The kids also weighed in on the debate around the extent of the ban. The two options bandied in Salem were a "bell-to-bell" policy or just inside classrooms. The latter would allow kids to use their phones during passing period and lunch. Several advocated for that change. That mirrored the debate within the Oregon legislature. It ultimately led to a stalemate and the need for Gov. Kotek's executive ruling. "When you make a decision like this, you don't know how it will ultimately work," Kotek told the students. "I appreciate you adapting to the situation and making it work for you." While things could change in the future, the governor is pleased with the early results. The phone ban is here to stay.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The Trump administration is plotting an interagency body to confront malign hackers, pilot programs to secure critical infrastructure across states and other steps tied to its freshly-released cyber strategy, National Cyber Director Sean Cairncross said Monday.

The “interagency cell” will bring together agencies like the Justice Department, the Department of State, the FBI and the Pentagon, which will make it clear that going on cyber offense isn’t just about attacking enemies in cyberspace, Cairncross said.

“Sure, that’s part of it, but that’s not all of it,” he said at an event hosted by USTelecom. It will include diplomatic efforts, arrests and more, he said. “As President Trump has made clear, he expects results, and he’s empowered the team under him to go get them.”

A series of pilot programs will be catered to specific critical infrastructure industries in specific states, such as water in Texas and beef in South Dakota, Cairncross said. Different sectors operate at more or less mature levels, he said.

“One of the things that we are working to do is to align those sectors and prioritize those sectors in a way that makes sense,” he said.

Cairncross said the administration wants to share information with industry better, and will be looking as well at revising regulations in some instances. One of those instances is the Securities and Exchange Commission’s 2023 incident disclosure rule, which drew some of the most vehement industry opposition under the Biden administration’s’ pursuit of cyber regulations. The idea is to make sure they “make sense for industry,” Cairncross said.

But the administration also will have things it seeks from the private sector. That will include bringing together CEOs and sending the message to them that “you need to dedicate some real resources,” he said.

Cairncross has spoken before about wanting to establish an academy to address education and training in a nation with persistent cybersecurity job openings, but there’s more attached to it, he said.

The effort, which Cairncross said the administration would release details on soon, will also include a foundry (which “will be able to scale with private capital new innovation, and deploy it more quickly”) and an accelerator (“so when there’s preceded financing on on projects to really ramp that up and be able to scale as well and overcome some of the procurement hurdles that are often based in in this space”).

Cairncross said at a second event Monday that another forthcoming step was a law enforcement pilot program to better share information with state and local governments.

“We’re looking for ways to streamline information sharing from the USG side,” Cairncross said at a Billington Cybersecurity event, using the acronym for “U.S. government.” “Often, ‘how’ we know things is extremely sensitive, ‘what’ we know is less so,” he said. The goal is “to figure out how to communicate that in a helpful, actionable way.”

Updated, 3/9/26: to include comments about law enforcement pilot program.

The post Sean Cairncross lays out what’s coming next for Trump’s cyber strategy appeared first on CyberScoop.

This week we went down to Phoenix Arizona where we teamed up with the Arizona Cyber Warfare Range (AZCWR) for a great event at Grand Canyon University! Black Hills Information […]

The post Webcast World Tour: Arizona Cyber Warfare Range appeared first on Black Hills Information Security, Inc..

Sierra Ward // Last year I listened to a podcast* from Freakonomics that has stuck with me – in fact, I think it’s changed the way I think – powerful stuff […]

The post The Courage to Learn appeared first on Black Hills Information Security, Inc..

Lisa Woody // On the 23rd of December, a cyber attack left hundreds of thousands of people in the Ukrainian region of Ivano-Frankivsk without power. This was the first confirmed […]

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