School going hacker uncovers major fault that exposed 5 million records

Eighteen years old Bill Demirkapi is unlike teen-hackers from decades ago because instead of hacking into the school software to change his grades, he revealed his findings on major vulnerabilities that exposed millions of sensitive records.

At the Defcon hacker conference in Las Vegas, Demirkapi presented his findings from three years of scanning school software by Blackboard and Follett which contained serious bugs that would allow a hacker to gain access to student data, Wired reports.

Blackboard's software particularly exposed 5 million vulnerable records including student grades, immunisation records, cafeteria balance, cryptographically hashed passwords and photos. While in Follett's software, the bugs would have given a hacker access to student data like grade point average, special education status, number of suspensions, and passwords.