KENORA — The top official at the Keewatin-Patricia District School Board said they are working with the company whose systems were compromised, causing a data breach that’s affecting school boards across the province and North America.
The KPDSB was notified on Wednesday that a breach had occurred with the PowerSchool application, said director of education Christy Radbourne. She added that the board uses the platform for its student information system, where it collects student data like names and contact information, as well as limited staff data. According to a press release issued by the school board Thursday afternoon, they were told the breach happened between December 22 and 28, 2024.
Radbourne says that the board is investigating. “We're currently in the investigatory stage to determine exactly what data may have been compromised, so we don't know exactly what data at this time has been.” According to the board’s release, PowerSchool “has assured KPDSB that the data accessed by an unauthorized user has been deleted and was not shared or posted online,” adding that the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario has been notified.
Radbourne added that all students, families, and staff have been notified of the situation, and that, should anyone’s data have found to have been compromised, they will be notified individually.
“At this time there is no action that families need to take or staff need to take, and that we will, as the investigation proceeds, be notifying individuals if there is any of their data [that] was personally compromised and what steps they can take after that,” Radbourne said.
The KPDSB has about 4,800 students.
A spokesperson with the Kenora Catholic District School Board told Newswatch that their board doesn’t use the PowerSchool application, but that they’re “monitoring the situation closely.”
