Buena Vista University in Storm Lake, Iowa officials say someone gained unauthorized access last month to the personal identification information of some 93,000 people associated with the university that was stored in a computer database.

 

BVU President Fred Moore said that information services staff discovered the security breach of the university's information system June 4. A computer forensics team was immediately called in to investigate. Moore said there is no evidence that the personal information, which includes names and driver's license and social security numbers stored from 1987 to the present, has been used by the hacker. "It's a very regrettable episode, and we're sorry for any inconvenience that it may have caused the people whose information may have been accessed," he said.

 

The university mailed letters to those affected by the security breach. Out of an abundance of caution, Moore said BVU is offering a free one-year subscription to a credit monitoring service, which includes $25,000 in fraud insurance for each individual. Campus officials are also taking additional steps to secure BVU's databases.