Article: UCLA break-in puts data on 800,000 at risk

Cnet News.com reports: UCLA break-in puts data on 800,000 at risk

Administrators discovered November 21 that the database had been compromised, according to a letter dated Tuesday that was posted to the university’s Web site (PDF here). The hacker had exploited a previously undetected software flaw and gained access to the database from October 2005 until the discovery

UCLA’s security breach is among the largest to hit a university. Earlier this year, for example, Western Illinois University suffered a hacker attack that compromised the personal information of 180,000 people, and Ohio University found three of its servers, one of which contained 137,000 Social Security numbers, had been compromised.

Last year, the University of Southern California suffered a security breach of a database containing personal information on 275,000 applicants over an eight-year period.

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