The California Department of Education said Friday that a hacker accessed the data of millions of students by exploiting the system of a nonprofit contractor that works with the state. The data included students’ names, birth dates, addresses, and disability status.
Educational Testing Service (ETS) began notifying students and families on Oct. 16 of the breach, which involved an unauthorized party using a compromised login to copy records from a secure file transfer site between May 22 and Sept. 18.
More than 5.7 million students were enrolled in California during the 2025–2026 school year.
“ETS takes the security of student information with the utmost seriousness, and sincerely regrets that this incident occurred,” the department said in a statement. …