The PowerSchool Data Breach: What Schools Should Know

The PowerSchool data breach occurred in 2024. Hackers broke into the PowerSchool student information system (SIS) and accessed the personal information of students and educators. 

The breach affected millions of students and teachers across various school districts in the US and Canada. The Power School data breach showed that cyber threats are equally dangerous for the education sector as any other industry.

This guide covers all you need to know about the PowerSchool data breach 2025, current updates about it, and the lessons from the Power school data breach. 

Note: Account breaches are often a result of inadequate privacy and security. We recommend connecting to iProVPN to encrypt your browsing activities, ensuring complete online anonymity. 

What Was the PowerSchool Data Breach?

The PowerSchool data breach was a cyberattack that occurred in late December 2024. Unauthorized activity was detected in mid-December; by the end of the month, the Power school data breach occurred. Hackers gained access to the personal information of teachers and students, impacting numerous schools across the US and Canada. 

What Happened in the PowerSchool Data Breach?

This data breach wasn’t sudden; unauthorized account activity was already being noticed in mid-December. By the end of the month, hackers had accessed and stolen all sensitive information. 

Here are the details of the PowerSchool data breach 2025:

• Access Point: Hackers reportedly gained access through the PowerSource customer support portal via a compromised credential. Meaning, a staff member must have been a target of a phishing attack. There was also a lack of MFA on the system. 
• Breached Data: Hacked data included student and teacher tables in the SIS. It may have included names, contact information, dates of birth, social security and insurance numbers, frades, and medical alert information.

List of the Powerschool Data Breach Affected Schools

Schools from various districts became victims of the Power school data breach. Students and teachers in the US and Canada lost their sensitive information from their SIS portal due to this breach. While there isn’t an accurate list of all schools affected by the breach, here are some of the schools affected:

1. Penn-Trafford and Franklin Regional.
2. Alamogordo Public Schools
3. Upper Canada District School Board
4. Floral Park-Bellerose School District
5. Reynoldsburg school
6. Marysville school
7. Big Walnut and Westerville

The breach heavily impacted schools. There were up to 80 Canadian schools affected, and various others in the US. However, there’s no comprehensive report of schools affected by the PowerSchool data breach 2025.

What We Know about the Powerschool Data Breach Class Action Lawsuit

Current Update: Matthew Lane, a college student, has pleaded guilty to the charges of identity theft, cyber extortion, and unauthorized access to computers. He has been sentenced to four years in prison and $14.1 million in restitution after extorting $2.85 million in Bitcoin from a K-12 software provider network. 

Following the breach, multiple lawsuits were filed. Plaintiffs include school districts, students, parents, and educators. These lawsuits claim negligence, breach of contract, invasion of privacy, and unjust enrichment. 

The matters are now centralized into a federal multidistrict litigation (MDL). A court in this case has issued an order for a mandatory settlement conference. Currently, schools and districts continue investigating the breach. As a result, PowerSchool has offered two years of complimentary identity protection to students and educators.

Some school boards and districts are still renewing contracts with PowerSchool. And, some State attorneys general are investigating. The Texas attorney general filed a lawsuit against PowerSchool, claiming it misled about its cybersecurity practices and failed to protect children’s data. 

What is the Current PowerSchool Data Breach Update?

Powerschool is continuing to send notifications and offer credit monitoring and identity protection services to affected students and teachers through its partner, Experian. 

While the breach occurred in December, people have still been receiving notifications from PowerSchool. These may look like spam. Currently, PowerSchool is taking steps to secure its systems. These include patching the vulnerability and resetting passwords. 

What Steps Should Schools Take to Protect Student Data After a Major Education Platform Breach?

Schools must immediately notify the affected parties and conduct an investigation into the breach. The process is divided into 3 phases, where each phase describes the steps to follow according to the timeline. 

Phase 1: The First 24-72 Hours

As an administrator in school, create a cross-functional team, including the relevant academic staff, IT leadership, legal counsel, and others. Reach out to the educational platform for an official statement regarding the data exposed. Press for a written report and the timeline. 

Meanwhile, immediately force a password reset for all staff and student accounts linked to the platform. Work with the internal IT team and the vendor to look for suspicious logins. Following that, inform the staff about the breach and issue a clear and concise communication to the school.

We recommend avoiding speculation, technical jargon, and assigning blame prematurely. The tone must be serious, proactive, and responsible.

Phase 2: First Week to Month

This phase requires you to support the affected individuals, investigate the issue, and mitigate the damage. Set up a webpage with FAQs, vendor’s official updates, and links to important resources. If the Personally Identifiable Information (PII) was exposed, the district vendor should offer at least one year of free credit monitoring and identity theft protection services. 

Conduct a preliminary internal audit to share what exact data the school shares with the vendor, when suspicious activity started, and the patterns of it. Work with a legal consultant to determine if the breach must be reported to the state or the federal authorities. 

Phase 3: Ongoing

This is a long-term action plan that requires you to strengthen the third-party vendor management process by implementing a rigorous vetting process. Send the vendors a security questionnaire before adopting their technology. 

Ensure that every vendor handling student data signs a strong Data Privacy Agreement. Meanwhile, maintain a curated list of the vetted educational tools that teachers and staff are permitted to use. 

Implement MFA for all staff and students on platforms that support it. This is one of the most effective security controls. Train staff annually on how to identify phishing attempts and the importance of strong passwords. 

What Are the Common Vulnerabilities Exploited in Breaches of Student Information Systems?

Breaches in student systems are rarely due to a single hacker sitting behind the screen. It’s often due to multiple technical vulnerabilities, unreliable security practices, and human error. Here are the common vulnerabilities often exploited in breaches of student information systems: 

1. Weak Passwords and Social Engineering Attacks

Phishing and credential stuffing are among the most common methods to break into accounts. Attackers can access accounts via a single staff member’s credentials. 

At the same time, simple and easy-to-remember passwords are the greatest red flag. They’re easier for the black hats to guess. Or, if you’re reusing the passwords, hackers may use the breached credentials for a credential stuffing attack. 

2. Technical Vulnerabilities

Don’t ignore system updates. These include bug fixes, security patches, and new updates that help improve system security. Not installing the updates might result in the black hats exploiting these vulnerabilities. Meanwhile, schools are rapidly adopting cloud-based SIS. System misconfigurations come with a major risk in these cases. 

3. Lack of Encryption

Encryption is important to keep your information secure. It scrambles your data into an unreadable format, making it difficult to decipher and convert into a readable language. Implementing encryption methods keeps your personal details, any financial data, and your credentials inaccessible.

Lack of encryption for remaining and in-transit data of the SIS may lead to a cyberattack. The black hats can easily read the data. This is why the data being transmitted should always use HTTPS/TLS encryption.

4. Insufficient Vendor Risk Management

Schools often use third-party vendors for testing, tutoring, and exam paper checking. These tools require access to student data. However, they might become a backdoor for the SIS if they don’t implement adequate and reliable security measures. 

How Can Parents Check if Their Child’s Information Was Exposed in a School Data Breach?

Wait for an official notification from the school. The educational institute is supposed to release an official notification regarding the data breach, the information exposed, and what steps the school is planning to take to mitigate any future security vulnerabilities. Following this, here’s what to do as a parent: 

1. Wait for an Official Notification

The school will send out an official notification. This is often done through an official email to the individuals. This is the most reliable information from the school. It will document if the child’s data was involved and what specific data was exposed. 

2. Look for Any Unusual Activity

Notice of any unusual activity. After your school notifies you, ensure that you keep checking your account to see if there are still any unusual activities on it. Moreover, keep an eye out for scams. Data breaches may attract scammers. In PowerSchool’s case, it has advised that it will not contact any individuals by phone or email.

3. Review the Saved Information

Review your child’s saved personal information on the PowerSchool app. Remove any sensitive information saved on the app if the school already hasn’t. Stay updated on the news from the school and PowerSchool.

Powerschool Data Breach Security Lessons

The PowerSchool data breach 2025 highlights the importance of efficient vendor risk management, comprehensive response planning, and the implementation of security measures, such as MFA. Here are the security lessons from PowerSchool: 

• Formal Vendor Risk Management: Schools and organizations must implement rigorous security assessments for all third-party vendors. Ensure vendor contracts include timely patching, security audits, and immediate breach notification. 
• Encrypt Sensitive Data: Data encryption is now a mandatory security practice. Reliable encryption ensures that the stolen data is unusable to the attackers. All encryption keys must be stored separately from the encrypted data and managed under a strict security policy.
• Zero Trust Architecture: You cannot rely on a single layer of security. An in-depth strategy is crucial. Implement Zero-Trust principles, requiring every person and device to verify their identity. 
• Store Minimal, Required Data: File transfer systems like MOVEit often become a dumping ground for large volumes of sensitive data. Organizations must regularly audit and delete old, unnecessary data. Strictly enforce the least privilege and data minimization policy to collect and retain required information only. 
• Timely Incident Response Plan: A slow or unclear response enhanced the damage. Develop, document, and regularly test a comprehensive incident response plan for such incidents. Timely communication with the affected individuals and the public. Delays erode trust and might lead to legal penalties. 

Final Note

The Power School data breach leaves us with important security lessons, i.e., weak passwords and predictable credentials may result in a significant loss. Most data breaches are a result of credential stuffing or a phishing attack. And, using a strong and unique password significantly helps with escaping the threat. 

We recommend using a reliable VPN, such as iProVPN to leverage unmatched security protection and complete browsing anonymity. Connect to your preferred server and browse the web without the black hats ever spying on your activities.