Computers in one of UNM’s largest departments were hacked last semester, disabling hundreds of terminals and shutting down online services for a week.
But no personnel or student information was stolen, said Chris Vallejos, Institutional Support Services spokesman.
“I don’t believe it was a virus. They were hacked into, and it’s still under investigation where the malicious attack came from,” he said. “These are very difficult to track.”
Vallejos said around 200 PCs will need to be either replaced or restored as a result of the hacking; however, there is no estimate for how much the restoration will cost.
Mary Vosevich, Physical Plant Department director, said employees in the department haven’t had Internet access since October, when the attack happened. She said Information Technology just installed about a dozen computers with Internet access this month.
“Obviously, there are things you do every day in this day in age where you access the Internet,” she said.
Even though employees didn’t have Internet access, Vosevich said the speed of PPD services wasn’t affected.
“I think we’ve been able to hold our own through all of this,” she said.
Vosevich said information on PPD issues was announced on UNM Today, such as e-mail and other online services. Online services — including the iService desk — are shut down from Feb. 17 to today.
“We realized pretty quickly what was going on,” she said. “That was one of the reasons we were more or less shut down.”
PPD takes care of all building maintenance at UNM, including landscaping and custodial services, according to its Web site. The department has almost 500 employees.
Vallejos said PPD personnel realized something was wrong when the server started lagging. He said the hackers increase the number of times a certain Web site is visited, which slows down Internet access.
The hackers were from out of the country, Vosevich said, and the attack is still under investigation.
“There are folks that that’s just what they do,” she said. “I think it’s some kind of entertainment for them to try to hack in, and one of them was successful here.”
Vosevich said some compromised computers may be replaced completely.
“We have a computer-renewal plan here at the Physical Plant, so every couple years we replace so many computers,” she said. “We have some new computers that we have installed.”
The need for new computers arises when older ones that can’t be fixed with the newest technology, Vallejos said.
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“Some machines over three to four years (old) must be replaced because they can’t handle the new software,” he said.
Vanessa Baca, a Planning and Communication representative, said she has never heard of a department being hacked into before this incident.
All networks and people who access the Internet are vulnerable to an attack like this, Vallejos said.
“Anyone, any place can be hacked,” he said. “Someone can just open up an e-mail attachment — these folks are very, very sophisticated.”
