Skip to content
topics.

Canvas LMS hacked, students locked out during finals

techMay 7, 202656939

Canvas, the learning-management system used by thousands of schools, was hacked Thursday, locking students out of course pages, grades and quizzes at Harvard, UC Berkeley, Rutgers, Texas A&M and Kansas State during finals week. Students WHO tried to open assignments or submit exams saw an attacker message or a service-unavailable notice while Canvas said its software was temporarily unavailable. Texas A&M redirected traffic from canvas.tamu.edu to block the compromised login page and Rutgers said it is evaluating next steps as instructors and administrators scramble to reschedule or secure time-sensitive assessments. The outage matters because blocked access to graded work and timed exams can delay submissions, grading and graduation decisions for thousands of students and trigger academic integrity and administrative headaches.

Jen Mercieca
@jenmercieca.bsky.social

Idk if y’all are following the Canvas hack story, but apparently whoever hacked it is holding each uni’s access to canvas for ransom. Grades are due for graduation and no one can log on. 😬

2432h ago
Jen Mercieca37

Props to the hackers for kairos. 😬

Dan Lawson 14

I can give an A to each of my students if that helps

Phil Garnock-Jones9

I recommend getting a big *sheet* of paper, *spreading* it out on a table, and writing the names and grades on it with a pencil. Presumably the papers are graded, so the information is available.

Whorfin8

Gee maybe letting for-profit tech firms take over every function in universities was a bad idea?

We do not stan8

Worst part is this isn't the first time Shiny Hunters has hacked the company. They never properly fixed the backdoor, allegedly.

Matthew Boedy5

Schools starting to release statements this afternoon. Could be thousands

Ginger Snap and Cam 🖖3

i am as concerned as hackers releasing Canvas messages, which could include sensitive/private communications about all manner of things.

Frederick Winslow Homer Simpson3

There was a time before Canvas and Blackboard. Things worked pretty well I think I'm headed back to that world.

Talos_XLIV2

Yes, I saw reports hitting here earlier today sometime around noon-ish. I had an opportunity at the start of 2026 to have/use Canvas on my laptop for distance learning and said, "No thanks. Pass." Our interconnectedness is truly a double-edged sword and I, for one, have grown quite wary of it.

Middle Manager Mom ☕️2

Yup. My son is a senior in the middle of midterms. 🫠

Norm Charlatan
@normcharlatan.bsky.social

Worried that the Canvas hack means that I have lost all of the IP to my online course, Faces of Paul Giamatti.

1201h ago
Matt Johnson2

Sounds like things went… Sideways

David Hull 胡大衛
@hushuo.bsky.social

If the end of the semester Canvas hack has taught us anything, it's that universities need to double down on giving everything to borderline monopoly tech run by megalomaniac private equity dbags.

752h ago
Keith Ng8

Goodbye 40% of budget going to Canvas! Hello 35% of budget going to Canvas and 25% of budget going to Canvas Premium Protection Support!

Nolan Zugernat3

It’s a big problem. On the other hand though, running your own system these days carries security risks that a lot of schools just don’t have the resources to handle. I’m OK with returning to paper.

Liz Neeley
@lizneeley.bsky.social

Most coverage is local so far, but after another hack & ransom demand, Canvas is down for maintenance thetech.com/2026/05/07/c... I checked: 24 of the 25 largest universities in the US all use Canvas - Texas A&M, Ohio State, UW, UW Madison, UMN, Penn... I think NYU is sole exception (Brightspace)

322h ago
Tessa Brown
@tessa.germnetwork.com

This Canvas hack is why the future is end-to-end encrypted. Those in control of organizations want access to their users’ data while keeping interlopers out, but as the threat environment accelerates they may be forced to confront that as long as they can access the data, so can hackers.

383h ago
Brendan Cantwell
@cantb.bsky.social

What I’ve learned from the Canvas hack is that everyone’s MacBook screen has the same smudges as mine does

443h ago
The Go Off Kings
@gooffkings.bsky.social

I've heard of Canvas Hack...but Stefan Heck? Yep, and he's hosting the stream tonight, while I'm sitting on my rump making everyone crazy! LIVE NOW twitch.tv/gooffkings

372h ago
noam chompers
@noamchompers.bsky.social

just hearing about the Canvas hack. really worried about the fate of my intellectual property (last minute Announcements apologetically cancelling class for Personal Reasons)

321h ago
Fred Scharmen
@sevensixfive.bsky.social

The Canvas hack is basically Act III of the long prophecied “Crisis in Higher Education.” COVID forced everyone to go online, AI data hunger centralized the edtech platforms, and now there’s a vulnerable single point of failure for all universities in North America. Happy summer!

242h ago
David Ziff
@djsziff.bsky.social

I am going to be very upset if my memo comments get leaked as part of this Canvas hack. Everyone is going to know my thoughts on "As such," expletive constructions, the lonely "this," why you shouldn't predict what the other side will argue, and so much more!

233h ago
Sophie the Bearable3

Yeah, sure, but what do you really think of em dashes and the Oxford comma?

Joe Dunman3

Ah, I see new legal writers are the same everywhere.

Simon Stern2

The lonely this is a pretty serious and pervasive problem.

Mark Pekala2

"As such" does not mean "therefore"!!!!!!!

tweety fish
@sifu.tweety.fish

Billion percent chance the Canvas hack used LLM tools of some sort (probably not mythos; most likely just to quickly exploit an unpatched CVE, but who knows)

203h ago
rm [-r] lininger3

If nothing else, LLM wrote the phishing email.

dorian2

apparently niels provos put something out recently about this www.provos.org/p/finding-ze... (heard it via risky.biz/RB836/)

Ian Linkletter
@linkletter.org

Today's new Canvas hack is being treated like a password breach. Did your institution warn students yet? "Texas A&M administrators have additionally redirected traffic away from canvas.tamu.edu to prevent campus members from accessing the compromised login page." status.it.tamu.edu/incidents/n1...

103h ago
Caroline (Carrie) T. Schroeder
@ctschroeder.bsky.social

Canvas hack is yet another reason we need to rewatch Battlestar Galactica. <please imagine a gif of that scene where Adama unplugs the ship's computers from the network bc I couldn't find that scene as a gif online anywhere>

142h ago
Le Cagle
@lecagle.bsky.social

Roll call: who's gotten official communication from IT/admin about the Canvas hack? 5:35 on May 7th, University of Kentucky hasn't

134h ago
Melissa Johnson, PhD4

We got an email telling us that canvas is down, which we already knew. But no info on the hack

your buddy eric2

Got an email from my uni’s IT dept. around 4:30 Central. Set up and emailed around a non-Canvas webform for students to submit final projects. 😬

Q. Pheevr
@q.pheevr.ca

I think it’s really fucking boneheaded that Canvas is so centralized that it was possible for malefactors to compromise data from 9000 institutions in one fell hack.

122h ago
3 sources
cnn.comCanvas hack strands university students during finals week | CNNit.rutgers.eduNationwide security breach involving Canvas - Information Technologyubyssey.caLive updates: Canvas down after cyberattack

Related

Canvas LMS hacked, students locked out during finalstechSam Altman's management style scrutinized at OpenAI trialtechGoogle Chrome silently downloads a 4GB AI model, researchers warntech