LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — The Little Rock School District is making progress on returning its data after a ransomware attack. Now, steps are being taken to make sure this doesn't happen again, and support is being offered to those possibly affected.
For now former Board President Greg Adams, the past few weeks haven't been easy.
"I feel much better than I did a few weeks ago," Adams said. "It has been a very trying situation, a stressful thing I think for all of us that are involved because it has put us in such a difficult position."
While the district is working to put this behind them, there is still work to be done.
"We will need to sort through to really get a good understanding of what it is and who may have been impacted," Adams said.
During Thursday's board meeting, a letter was shared and discussed with the district community. Of note in the letter is that the district has made arrangements to stop the hack.
Also included is that LRSD will provide support services like credit monitoring and identity theft services.
"I'm hopeful that will, that we can have things in place in the first few months of next year," Adams said. "Because once we get a chance to sort through the data and really find out what we have, then we'll be able to contact those people."
Adams said the services will cost less than the $250,000 it took to get their data back. The district has also reached out to the attorney general's office for advice on how to avoid transparency issues if something like this were to happen again.
"We are trying to find the proper balance, the best balance that we can," Adams said. "We're trying to give them as much further information as we can without unnecessarily compromising the risk for harm for our students and employees and families."
Adams said information on how those services will work should roll out soon.