Huge Los Angeles Unified School district hit by cyberattack

By STEFANIE DAZIO, FRANK BAJAK and ZEKE MILLER
Associated Press

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A ransomware attack targeting the huge Los Angeles Unified School District over the Labor Day weekend prompted an unprecedented shutdown of the district’s information technology systems as authorities scrambled to trace the perpetrators and restrict potential damage. Schools in the nation’s second-largest district opened as scheduled on Tuesday and 540,000 students and 70,000 district employees were forced to change their passwords to prevent additional incursion from the ransomware attack. No demand for money was made. Such attacks have become a growing threat to U.S. schools, with several high-profile incidents reported since last year as pandemic-forced reliance on technology increases the impact.