K-12 Cybersecurity Insider | 12/15/2025 edition

Written By Doug Levin

A biweekly newsletter providing curated cybersecurity news to the K-12 community, as a public service of K12 SIX. Sign up for the K12 SIX mailing list to have future editions delivered to your inbox.

Mark Your Calendar

IL School District Closed for Three Days Due to Cybersecurity Incident

On Sunday, November 30, 2025, Zion Elementary School District 6 (IL) was impacted by a cybersecurity incident that resulted in the suspension of teaching and learning - and extracurriculars - for three days the following week. Students and teachers were welcomed back from Thanksgiving on Thursday, December 4. On its website, district leadership sought to reassure its community that the privacy and security of its students and staff remains their highest priority: “ZESD 6 has multiple safeguards in place to prevent cyberattacks on district systems, including usernames, passwords, and multi-factor authentication (MFA).”

FTC Takes Action Against Illuminate (Renaissance) for Negligent Cybersecurity Practices

Before the PowerSchool incident, there was Illuminate’s. Following on the heels of a joint settlement with three different state attorneys general (CA, CT, and NY), the federal government is now seeking to levy additional penalties against the firm, which was acquired by Renaissance on the heels of the incident. The FTC complaint details facts about the cyber incident that heretofore had not been public knowledge. For instance, the threat actor compromised still-active credentials held by an IT administrator who had left the company over three years prior. After nearly two weeks of unfettered access to Illuminate systems, the threat actor also extorted the company to prevent the release of the data they had exfiltrated and - like PowerSchool - the company paid the threat actor to delete the data. The FTC complaint is worth the read as it does a good job of debunking the company’s public claims about its privacy and security practices vs reality. Remember folks: trust and verify. Both steps are necessary, especially for your critical vendors.

Friends Don’t Let Friends Buy AI Toys for the Holidays

In news that really shouldn’t be a surprise to any of us following this more closely, it turns out that integrating AI chatbots into children’s toys is a recipe for…raised eyebrows, if not a lot more. Interested in digging deeper? Read the full report from U.S. PIRG here.

4th Annual National K-12 Cybersecurity Leadership Conference (Feb 2026)

Hosted by the K12 Security Information eXchange (K12 SIX), the 2026 National K-12 Cybersecurity Leadership Conference is a unique event designed to identify and share solutions and best practices to better defend the K-12 education sector from emerging cybersecurity threats, such as ransomware and data breaches. The fourth annual conference will be held February 24-26, 2026 in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Named a “top K-12 conference to attend in 2026” by K-12 Dive.

Members Get More

The K12 Security Information eXchange (K12 SIX) operates as the independent, non-profit information sharing and analysis center (ISAC) exclusively for the K-12 education sector. Founded in 2020, organizations eligible for membership include school districts, charter schools and charter management organizations, private/independent schools, regional education agencies, and state education agencies. K12 SIX members get more.

Doug Levin
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K-12 Cybersecurity Insider | 12/1/2025 edition