NORFOLK, Va. — A cyberattack targeting Canvas — the online platform students use for assignments, grades and finals — has impacted schools and universities across Virginia, including Old Dominion University.
The attack hit at one of the worst possible times: finals week.
For ODU freshman Deonte Bates, the outage struck while he was in the middle of finishing an essay.
"I was doing an assignment my essay for my English class and when I went to go back to the page to go over the prompt and everything the page was acting up and I wasn't able to access it," Bates said.
Bates says he initially thought the problem was on his end.
"I was just thinking. Maybe it was like my Wi-Fi or just like my browser I was trying to refresh it wasn't working," Bates said.
A group calling itself "Shiny Hunters" claims responsibility for the hack and has threatened to release data by May 12.
With the system still down, Bates says completing his work is impossible.
"As far as submitting it and doing everything right there's no way for me to do that right now," Bates said.
Sophomore Tyler Henry says his biggest concern is how finals will move forward, noting he has not yet heard from his professors about next steps.
"I haven't gotten any email from my Professor. I know like I've sent one you know regarding like the final cause I have online final tomorrow for my classes so I was trying to see how that was gonna work," Henry said.
Henry says he is hoping professors make accommodations.
"The Hope really just like teachers either I don't know just cancel the final or just like in someway we were able to take it like in person," Henry said.
"It's just crazy that they would come at this time where everybody like everybody doing a finals," Henry said.
Students say they are waiting for guidance from the administration on what the next steps are.
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