South Lyon Community Schools were closed for three days this week after a suspected ransomware attack took down its network on Sept. 14 — just three weeks into the school year.
It’s the latest in a troubling trend where cybercriminals target public school districts in an attempt to extort cash and steal personal information. Cyberattacks on education, including K-12 schools and universities, rose 23% year-over-year in the first half of 2025, according to a report from Comparitech, a cybersecurity and online privacy product review website.
Through June, there were 130 cyberattacks on educational institutions with an average ransom demand of $556,000, the site reported. In fact, between July 2023 and December 2024, 82% of all K-12 public schools in the U.S. experienced a cyberattack, according to a March report from nonprofit Center for Internet Security…