An unknown number of students at Buena Vista Horace Mann (BVHM) school in San Francisco had their information exposed when a district worker emailed their information to unauthorized individuals.
The error occurred on April 10 when the email containing student identification numbers, student names, and student usernames and default passwords for San Francisco Unified School District (SFUSD) systems, of which BVHM is part, and tools, including SFUSD email, student portal, and digital learning applications, for all current and some former BVHM students was sent to some families in the district.
The school district reported the families that received the email did have access to accounts belonging to students other than their own for about two hours. School officials do not believe any of the accounts were accessed, and administrators are looking into putting additional precautions into effect so this type of error does not reoccur.
In a letter to parents, school officials did try to turn the event into a learning opportunity saying parents should speak to their children about the importance of maintaining good password hygiene, choose strong passwords, to change them frequently, and to protect their information online.
