PowerSchool recently notified us of a cybersecurity incident involving unauthorized access to data through its PowerSource customer support portal. The breach, which was discovered on December 28, 2024, affected certain users of PowerSchool’s Student Information System (SIS). However, Waukegan Public Schools does not use PowerSchool SIS, and our systems and data were not impacted by this incident.

The company has confirmed that the incident has been contained, and there is no evidence of ongoing unauthorized activity. We appreciate PowerSchool’s transparency and diligence in handling this matter and remain committed to protecting our community’s information. For more details, please review PowerSchool’s full notice to us below. 

Dear Valued Customer,

As the main point of contact for your school district, we are reaching out to make you aware that on December 28, 2024, PowerSchool became aware of a potential cybersecurity incident involving unauthorized access to certain information through one of our community-focused customer support portals, PowerSource. Over the succeeding days, our investigation determined that an unauthorized party gained access to certain PowerSchool Student Information System (“SIS”) customer data using a compromised credential.

While this incident affected certain customers of PowerSchool SIS, our thorough forensic investigation has confirmed that information related to other PowerSchool products was not affected. As you are not a PowerSchool SIS customer, your products were not impacted as a result of this incident. Please note there is no further action needed from you at this time and we are simply notifying you to be as transparent as possible and because we value our partnership with you.

As soon as we learned of the potential incident, we immediately engaged our cybersecurity response protocols and mobilized a cross-functional response team, including senior leadership and third-party cybersecurity experts. We have also informed law enforcement.

We have also deactivated the compromised credential and restricted all access to the affected portal. Lastly, we have conducted a full password reset and further tightened password and access control for all PowerSource customer support portal accounts.

Importantly, the incident is contained, and we have no evidence of malware or continued unauthorized activity in any of the PowerSchool environments. PowerSchool is not experiencing, nor expects to experience any operational disruption and continues to provide services as normal to our customers.

We are addressing the situation in an organized and thorough manner, following all of our incident response protocols. PowerSchool is committed to providing affected customers with the resources and support they may need as we work through this together.

Again, although your PowerSchool products were not impacted, we wanted to assure you that we are addressing the situation in an organized and thorough manner, following all of our incident response protocols. Should you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact your customer service manager. Thank you for your continued support and partnership.