Data Breach Alert: Western Carolina University exposes hundreds of social security numbers

Posted by Joe on March 24th, 2008

The social security numbers of 555 Western Carolina University alumni were exposed to hackers when a university computer containing the information was breached.

The impacted students had all signed up for an alumni newsletter. Their social security numbers were stored with their subscription information because WCU had used social security numbers as a students university identification numbers up until last fall.

University officials said that they were aware of other attempts to access this data going back as far as 2006. There are no reports of any misuse of the data at this point.

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