A hacker has breached Mobile Guardian, a global digital classroom management platform, and remotely wiped data from at least 13,000 iPads and Chromebooks used by students.
Mobile Guardian, a partner of 'Google for Education,' provides device management, parental monitoring, secure web filtering, and classroom management services for K-12 schools. The platform operates across various systems, including Android, iOS, Windows, ChromeOS, and macOS.
On August 4, 2024, the platform announced it had suffered a security breach that affected users in North America, Europe, and Singapore. During the breach, the hacker gained unauthorized access and remotely wiped a small percentage of iOS and ChromeOS devices. However, Mobile Guardian emphasized that there was no evidence of data access or theft during the attack.
"This incident resulted in a small percentage of devices being unenrolled from Mobile Guardian and wiped remotely," the company stated, while reassuring users that no data had been compromised.
The breach follows an unrelated IT outage on July 30, 2024, caused by a misconfiguration.
While Mobile Guardian reported minimal impact, Singapore’s Ministry of Education revealed that around 13,000 students across 26 secondary schools had their iPads and Chromebooks wiped by the hacker. In response, the Ministry expressed strong concerns and promptly removed the app from student devices. Efforts are now underway to restore the affected devices.
As a precaution, Mobile Guardian has suspended access to its platform, limiting students' use of their devices until further notice.
