Princeton University says database containing donor, alumni info breached
A database containing personal information belonging to Princeton University donors, alumni, students, faculty and parents was hacked on November 10.
University officials announced the hack in an email sent to alumni on November 15 and in a blog post on the school website.
The hacker was in the database for less than 24 hours and it is unclear what information was viewed, according to the blog post.
Information including names, email addresses, telephone numbers, and home and business addresses is stored on the database, in addition to donation information.
The database does not “generally” contain Social Security numbers, passwords or financial information such as credit card or bank account numbers, the blog post said. Student records covered by federal privacy law also are not stored in the database.
No systems other than the advancement database were accessed.
Princeton is one of a string of Ivy League universities to be recently hit with a data breach.
In June, a hacker seeking data on affirmative action in admissions broke into a Columbia University database. Last month, an email containing offensive language and threats regarding a data breach was sent to thousands of students and alumni at the University of Pennsylvania.
Suzanne Smalley
is a reporter covering privacy, disinformation and cybersecurity policy for The Record. She was previously a cybersecurity reporter at CyberScoop and Reuters. Earlier in her career Suzanne covered the Boston Police Department for the Boston Globe and two presidential campaign cycles for Newsweek. She lives in Washington with her husband and three children.