The PUSD website was hacked by a group known as “Team Infected” on Sunday, Sept. 23.

The hacked website displayed computer code in the center of the page and a message reading, “Hello there. You’ve been hacked by an Anarchy Forums member.”

Senior Julian Frost said one of his friends sent him the link to the district website.

Frost said, “There were two gifs of women doing sexually explicit things.”

Senior Cecil Lam said he came across the website and wasn’t sure if it was real or not.

“I thought it was a joke at first, like a fake website. I went to the PHS website then clicked the ‘Back to PUSD Main Website’ link,” Lam said, “It was weird.”

Aside from the pornographic images, Frost said there was a series of messages saying the website has a terrible security system and the hackers have access to all of our students’ information.

Sophomore Apryl Hsu said she was a little worried when she first saw the website.

Hsu said, “It was scary because I thought someone could potentially have my student information.”

However, Instructional Technology Coordinator Stephanie Griffin said that the student information system is managed separately from the district website.

“It’s on a different server, so it’s even housed in a different place,” Griffin said, “[Student information] is very, very safe.”

The administration was informed of the hacking incident Sunday evening.

Griffin said, “My understanding is that a good Samaritan contacted Principal Kitchens that it’s been hacked.”

Griffin said Principal Richard Kitchens sent a message out to herself, Assistant Superintendent of Education Services Randall Booker, and a few others Sunday night.

“We contacted Danny Garvin, who used to be the technology coordinator at the high school. He put a blank page up,” Griffin said.

Griffin said she was relieved the administration was able to act so quickly upon discovering the website was hacked.

“It’s embarrassing, especially for the district one to be hacked,” Griffin said.

Booker said he was shocked when he found out the district website had been hacked.

“I am frustrated because it is a huge waste of people’s resources and time, and it’s disgusting,” Booker said, “I have no idea what their whole purpose was.”

Booker proceeded to check the school websites to make sure they were all unaffected. He said he found that none of the other websites had been touched.

The district website is run off of WordPress and hosted by Rackspace.

Griffin said they are currently working with Rackspace to analyze the database records to see how the breech occurred.

“We’re going to be redoing the whole database up there to make sure there are no back door entrances that might have been left where someone could get back in,” Griffin said, “We have to be diligent about that.”

She said they will also be checking to see if any passwords were compromised. Griffin said if this is the case, they will be changing many passwords.

Technology Coordinator Jana Branisa said she believes the hackers did guess a working password into the content management system that maintains the district website.

“The way a password is guessed is for a person to write a computer program that tries out many typical, easy to guess password combinations until one of them is it,” said Branisa.

Branisa said the number one tool for secure access to information is a strong password.

The administration still does not know who is responsible for hacking the district website.

Booker said, “It doesn’t strike me as a student because usually students leave some kind of evidence that they’re a student.”

He said he believes an outside group is responsible.

Booker said he also looked at other district office websites around the Bay Area to see if the hacking incident was more than just Piedmont.

Booker said, “To my knowledge at least, at that time, no other school districts had been touched.”

The website was back up Monday, Sept. 24 morning for a short time, but is currently undergoing construction again. The tech team handling this case, which includes Griffin, is continuing to work with Rackspace to find out how the breach occurred and how they might improve the website’s security.