By CRISTINA JANNEY
Hays Post

No data was stolen during a ransomware attack against Hays USD 489 on Friday.

Superintendent John Thissen gave a report to the school board Monday night. The district lost temporary use of its servers and its website went down after an attack about 6 a.m. Friday.

The district was able to use backups to restore the website and many other functions before the end of the day on Friday.

The district did not pay the ransom request. The only costs to the district were the time and effort to deal with incident. District staff believe the attack was made through a special education server, which had the capability of being accessed from outside the district. That outside access is being closed due to the attack.

The incident was reported to the Hays police and FBI, who Thissen said classifies the hack as an attack of terror.

The only substantial data that was lost were files for the middle school yearbook. Thissen said they were lucky this is still early in the year so alternative content can be found. The district is working on creating a permanent backup system for that program.

The district is considering an audit of its cyber systems in lieu of the attack.