Mobile Guardian Hack: 13,000 Student Devices Wiped in Singapore

Singapore’s Ministry of Education has found that the data of 13,000 students in the country were remotely deleted in a cyberattack on Mobile Guardian, a British device management software provider.

On August 4, several Singaporean schools notified the ministry that some students using iPads or Chromebooks as personal learning devices were unable to access apps and information stored on their devices.

After conducting an investigation, the government found that the security incident was caused by unauthorized access to Mobile Guardian, an application widely used in the country’s schools as of 2020 that allows for device management, classroom management, student website filtering, and parental controls.

“Initial checks have shown that the perpetrator remotely wiped the devices of approximately 13,000 Singaporean students from 26 secondary schools,” Singapore’s Education Ministry said in a security alert.

The government contacted Mobile Guardian, which issued its own security advisory.

In that post, the software vendor admits it experienced a “security incident where a small percentage of devices were deregistered from (its platform) and their devices were remotely wiped.”

The attack affected users around the world, including in North America, Europe, and Singapore.

“There is no evidence to suggest the perpetrator had access to user data,” the retailer added.

Mitigation measures

The Mobile Guardian platform has suspended services to prevent unauthorized access. This means that users cannot log into the Mobile Guardian platform at this time and students will have limited access to their devices.

The Singapore government said it will remove the Mobile Guardian app from all iPads and Chromebooks and is considering additional mitigations.

Work is also underway to safely return the devices to normal use.

Mobile Guardian encourages students who are experiencing issues with their device to contact customer support at [email protected].

The retailer and the Singapore government said the incident was unrelated to a technical issue that occurred on July 30 affecting Mobile Guardian iPads in Singapore. That earlier incident was caused by a human configuration error.

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