{"id":214311,"date":"2026-02-17T00:05:00","date_gmt":"2026-02-17T05:05:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/02\/17\/why-ai-is-a-big-problem-for-school-cybersecurity\/"},"modified":"2026-02-17T00:15:07","modified_gmt":"2026-02-17T05:15:07","slug":"why-ai-is-a-big-problem-for-school-cybersecurity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/02\/17\/why-ai-is-a-big-problem-for-school-cybersecurity\/","title":{"rendered":"Why AI Is a Big Problem for School Cybersecurity"},"content":{"rendered":"

Why AI Is a Big Problem for School Cybersecurity<\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.edweek.org\/technology\/why-ai-is-a-big-problem-for-school-cybersecurity\/2026\/02<\/a><\/p>\n

Publish Date: 2026-02-17 00:05:00<\/a><\/p>\n

Source Domain: www.edweek.org<\/a><\/p>\n

Many school districts are ill-prepared to defend themselves against the growing threat of AI-powered cyberattacks, a problem that has been exacerbated by federal government cuts to programs that support school cybersecurity, experts say.<\/p>\n

Here is the heart of the problem: Just as educators have turned to generative AI tools to craft emails, conduct research, and analyze large amounts of data, so too have cybercriminals, who are using the technology to optimize attacks, said Don Ringelestein, the executive director of technology for Yorkville 115, a school district near Chicago.<\/p>\n

\u201cAI is billed as something that\u2019s going to save us time. It\u2019s going to be an assistant for us,\u201d he said. \u201cWell, that same thing applies to hackers. It\u2019s going make their jobs easier.\u201d<\/p>\n

Even before the use of AI expanded rapidly over the past few years, schools were already frequently the target of cyberattacks. Schools possess reams of sensitive data on children, which can fetch a high price on the dark web, and they often lack the resources to properly protect themselves. They also manage large amounts of money and personal data, such as employees\u2019 social security numbers.<\/p>\n

When they are hacked, schools can face enormous public pressure to give in to cybercriminals\u2019 demands. All of that makes schools prime targets for data theft and ransomware attacks.<\/p>\n

AI is now complicating an already difficult calculation for schools: How do school district technology leaders\u2014and by extension, all district employees\u2014protect themselves against cybercriminals who are leveraging AI to supercharge attacks?<\/p>\n

How AI is making school cyberattacks worse<\/h2>\n

There are several ways that cybercriminals can deploy readily available generative AI tools. <\/p>\n

To begin with, AI can write more sophisticated phishing emails. Spelling and grammatical…<\/p>\n

Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Why AI Is a Big Problem for School Cybersecurity https:\/\/www.edweek.org\/technology\/why-ai-is-a-big-problem-for-school-cybersecurity\/2026\/02 Publish Date: 2026-02-17 00:05:00 Source…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":214312,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/epe.brightspotcdn.com\/dims4\/default\/a093ae5\/2147483647\/strip\/true\/crop\/7167x4792+0+0\/resize\/942x630!\/quality\/90\/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fepe-brightspot.s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com%2Fdb%2F75%2F9e9c81914db48723f8e1381904f6%2F021126-ed-tec-sr-ai-threat-prothero-fs-1822585388.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[19,25,57],"class_list":["post-214311","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-generative-ai","tag-phishing","tag-security"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214311"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=214311"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214311\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":214313,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214311\/revisions\/214313"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/214312"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=214311"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=214311"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=214311"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}