Cybercrime group claims 600K records stolen from UC Berkeley Canvas amid nationwide blackout

[usonian]

https://www.dailycal.org/news/campus/cybercrime-group-seizes-uc-berkeley-canvas-600k-student-staff-records-at-risk/article_5b3b01de-bcad-45a1-994b-e0d19aa88591.html

Aarya Mukherjee | Senior Staff May 7, 2026

UC Berkeley’s learning management platform bCourses, the software that all 43,000 students use to access their class materials, has been seized by hackers. When some students attempted to log in Thursday afternoon, they were met with a red warning label, informing users that Instructure — the company that operates Canvas — has refused to pay a ransom.

In a statement to The Daily Californian, the black-hat cybercrime group ShinyHunters claims to have stolen “more than 600,000” UC Berkeley student and staff records and says it will leak them unless the campus pays a ransom.

Students’ access to Canvas was restored Friday afternoon, with campus officials advising that some may experience “intermittent performance as the bCourses platform stabilizes.”

The Canvas takedown affected hundreds of thousands of students nationwide as universities utilizing the Instructure service have seen their learning platforms pushed offline, with the same red warning message appearing on user screens

Lots more at the link.

Note:
According to 2024 data, Canvas is used by 41% of higher education institutions in North America.