After the Halifax Regional Centre for Education (HRCE) announced it shut down its before-and-after-school care program’s registration system last month due to a “privacy breach,” hackers tried getting into it, according to the organization.
“After it was announced, many people tried to hack into the system and were unsuccessful,” spokesperson Doug Hadley said in an interview on Friday.
He didn’t provide a specific number of people, but said the organization’s IT team reported the attempts.
The Excel program’s registration system was shut down on April 23 after users reported seeing other people’s personal information, including students’ names, birth dates and health information.
READ MORE: Halifax Excel program registration shut down because of ‘privacy breach’
Information of up to 1,200 people could have been seen by others, though, based on reports to the HRCE, Hadley said the organization thinks that the actual number is far less.
The exact cause of the incident hasn’t been fully determined yet.
“We know absolutely that it was not a hack. What we’ve determined is that it was some type of coding error,” Hadley said.
The system is still down, and a “similar” but more secure way of accepting applications is in the works for next year.
For now, people can apply for the program through mail, email, or a phone call, which will be time-stamped.
Registration for returning participants ends on Friday. Registration for new participants opens on May 14; the original pre-incident date was April 30.
“People try to hack into all systems all the time,” Hadley said.
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