
First published -
Last updated - 13/09/23
Last updated - 13/09/23
In yet another example of how one accidental click can see an organization managing a major data incident, a school in Barton-under-Needwood in Staffordshire has hit the headlines recently for mistakenly sharing student data by email.
An email sharing not only pupil’s names and grades but individual marks was shared with parents by error. According to reports, the same email was sent to students but staff were able to recall it in time.
Approximately 40 minutes after the first email was sent, the head teacher circulated a second email titled ‘Urgent Year 13 Grade Boundaries’, in which she asked all recipients not to open the email. The school has confirmed that the leaked results were sent out in a 'human error' and apologized to students and their families for the mistake.
This is not the first time an educational institution has felt the fallout of a data leak due to similar circumstances.
Last year, a Warwickshire based secondary school and sixth-form college managed a similar incident when families received COVID-19 results for the wrong students. While the incident reportedly impacted only a small number of students, the nature of the incident meant the story was quickly picked up by the press.
Recalling emails relies largely on the recipient’s compliance with the follow up request. Standard email recall is often not foolproof and can, instead, draw the recipient to read the recalled email through curiosity. What can be done to avoid these errors?
From experience, we know that time-strapped staff don’t have time to perform a triple check of every email before pressing ‘send’. Tech must do the hard work for them.
Here are five boxes any educational institution must tick to avoid a data leak:
When handling young people’s data, it goes without saying - every effort must be taken to manage it safely. Learn how more than 1,700 staff at Curio are emailing securely across more than 30 primary and secondary school locations and why educational institutes are choosing Zivver to strengthen their email security and avoid human error.
Ready for a deeper dive? So are we.