FBI, State Police probing cyber hack on Saginaw Township schools

SAGINAW TOWNSHIP, Mich. (WJRT) - Law enforcement agencies are investigating a cyber attack at a mid-Michigan school district.

Saginaw Township administrators noticed the issue Sunday, and the FBI and the Michigan State Police are investigating.

“It could have been a whole lot worse, but it certainly has been disruptive in an already disruptive year,’ says district superintendent Bruce Martin.

The coronavirus has been an issue for school districts for the past year and now Saginaw Township Community Schools have been hit by a computer virus.

Its believed hackers deployed ransomware that infected the district’s computer network.

“A lot of teachers went back old school, with books and paper and pencil,” says Martin.

So what is ransomware?

“It’s malware that infects a computer system or network that encrypts a person’s data making it useless to them,” says Matt McLalin of the Michigan State Police Cyber Command Center.

An entity, like a school district, can remove the virus by paying the person or group that has installed the malware money, a ransom. Once they are paid, the hackers provide a “key” in the form of a series of numbers, letters or characters that unlocks the encryption.

But law enforcement doesn’t encourage anyone to pay up.

“You pay them the money, they are just going to use that money to continue to make new malware and infect others,” says McLalin.

Martin is letting investigators deal with the cyber crooks.

“They are communicating almost daily with the hackers to figure out what exactly they want,” says Martin.

Matt McLalin of the Michigan Cyber Command Center says the hackers are tough to catch because they are mostly overseas. Russia is a big player in ransomware attacks.

It’s not clear how the district was hacked. McLalin says to prevent or foil a ransomware attack, never click on an email or website link you are not familiar with.

“Keep good back-ups, obviously, good, regular back-ups where you are regularly backing up your data, and keep them off-line,” he says.

Martin says investigators don’t believe any data was stolen by the hackers. He says the district’s computer systems are pretty much back up to normal for the most part and is glad classes were held all week.

“I think that sent a message that we can overcome this,” says Martin.

Unfortunately, this isn’t a rare occurrence.

Cyber security experts estimate there are four-thousand ransomware attacks *every day* worldwide.

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