16 year old Arrested For Cyberattacks On Miami-Dade Schools

These virtual classes are already hard enough, but a 16-year-old decided to make them even harder.

A Miami, Florida teenager was arrested Thursday after orchestrating a series of cyberattacks that disrupted virtual classes in the Miami-Dade school district this week, The Hill reports.

Authorities for the school district, which happens to be the fourth largest in the nation, were able to trace the IP address associated with the attacks and made the arrest of the teenager, who was identified as a junior at South Miami Senior High School.

The teenager admitted to the eight distributed denial of system (DDoS) attacks on the school system’s online distance learning platform, as well as other systems.

The student, who has not been named, is now charged with computer use in an attempt to defraud and with interference with an educational institution.

And just in case you are like me and not tech-savvy, DDoS attacks involve an attacker attempting to take down a server by overwhelming it with traffic.

This isn’t the first time the school has been targeted as it launched its online learning. More than a dozen cyberattacks have been reported since Monday. Schools were already dealing with a malfunction of software that severely inhibited more than 200,000 students within the district to attend virtual classes.

Miami-Dade Schools Police Department Chief Edwin Lopez released a statement Thursday that his department has worked with the FBI, the Secret Service, and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to investigate the attacks, adding that based on the investigation, he believes “other attackers are out there.”

“We will not rest until every one of them is caught and brought to justice,” Lopez said. “Cyber attacks are serious crimes, which have far-reaching negative impacts. Our message to anyone thinking of attempting a criminal act like this is to think twice. We will find you.”

On Thursday, Miami-Dade County Public Schools’ (M-DCPS) Superintendent Alberto Carvalho thanked the federal and state authorities for their assistance in the investigation.

“It is disheartening that one of our own students has admitted to intentionally causing this kind of disruption. However, I am confident that the M-DCPS family will continue to show its resilience and commitment to education, in the face of adversity,” Carvalho said.

The kids are already going through enough this year, let them learn!