Schools online as system safety confirmed

The confirmation that our network is safe and secure and a return to normal business practices will be welcomed by everyone.

The authority took schools offline as a precautionary measure on Monday afternoon (10 November) in response to a series of anti-virus alerts. IT security officers worked closely with the Scottish Cyber Coordination Centre, the national agency for cyber security, and other partners to carry out forensic analysis of the alerts and affected devices.

Data remains secure

The investigation concluded that there was no infiltration of the council's systems and its data remains secure. The education network is separate to the council's corporate network which was not affected.

Chromebooks were re-enabled on a school-by-school basis on Wednesday 11 November offering connection to key education sites including Google classroom. Schools used established business continuity plans to continue learning while windows devices were unavailable.

Full connectivity

Education, IT services, schools and facilities teams are now working on restoring full connectivity to all networks and systems. This work will be concluded by the end of today (13 November). Suppliers and national agencies including Department for Work and Pensions and Education Scotland have been kept informed throughout.

East Lothian Council Chief Executive Laurence Rockey said: "We take the security of our systems and the information they hold incredibly seriously. Our safeguards have done exactly what they are intended to do by detecting a potential threat; officers have then worked at speed to respond, maintain the integrity of our systems and carry out a robust investigation into the cause with Scottish Cyber Coordination Centre and other partners.

"This has been a cross-council effort not only in the response to the network alerts, but also to continue supporting children and young people to learn in schools.

"I'd like to commend all of our school teams, including facilities colleagues, families and learners for their patience and understanding while these investigations were completed. The confirmation that our network is safe and secure and a return to normal business practices will be welcomed by everyone."