Universities fail to get to grips with cyber security

By Ian Barker/ Posted on 8/21/2014
 
Comment: You would think all these universities and brains working overtime would have a firm grip on security

 
 
 
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As thousands of students prepare to return to university over the next few weeks, new research by security ratings company BitSight shows that this is a busy time for hackers too.
 
The researchers found that Ivy League schools, for example, see a 48 percent increase in the number of malware infections during the academic year from September to May.
 
  
In order to assess the security performance of American higher education institutions the research focuses on major collegiate athletic conferences. It finds that the security ratings for these conferences are considerably below those of retail and healthcare organizations.
 
Perhaps not surprising then that higher education institutions experience high levels of malware infections, the most prevalent infection coming from the Flashback malware, which targets Apple systems. Flashback accounted for 37 percent of infections seen in Ivy League universities and over 26 percent in SEC schools, pointing to the popularity of Apple systems among students. Other prominent malware detected includes Conficker, accounting for 21.7 percent of Ivy League infections.
 
betanews/ full article here/ http://betanews.com/2014/08/21/universities-fail-to-get-to-grips-with-cyber-security/