MOE to remove Mobile Guardian app from students’ devices after cybersecurity breach

SINGAPORE: The Ministry of Education (MOE) has announced that it will remove the Mobile Guardian application from all students' devices following a hacking incident that led to the remote wiping of devices belonging to over 10,000 secondary school students.

In a media statement on Monday (5 August), MOE revealed that it was alerted late Sunday night by schools about some students being unable to access their applications and stored information on their iPads or Chromebooks, which are used as personal learning devices.

Mobile Guardian, the device management app installed on these devices, allows parents to manage students' usage by restricting applications, websites, and screen time.

The MOE has voiced strong concerns to Mobile Guardian, the mobile device management company, regarding the incident.

According to MOE, Mobile Guardian's investigation uncovered a "global cybersecurity incident" involving unauthorized access to its platform, affecting customers around the world, including those in Singapore.

Preliminary checks have shown that about 13,000 students from 26 secondary schools in Singapore had their devices wiped remotely by the hacker.

MOE stated that there is currently no evidence suggesting that the hacker accessed students’ files.

"As a precautionary measure, MOE will remove the Mobile Guardian Device Management Application from all iPads and Chromebooks," said MOE.

"Efforts are underway to safely restore these devices to normal usage. MOE is considering other mitigating measures to regulate device usage to support learning during this period."

MOE clarified that the incident on Sunday was unrelated to the technical issues experienced by students at the end of July, which were caused by a human error in configuration by Mobile Guardian.

"We understand that students are naturally concerned and anxious about the incident," MOE acknowledged.

"MOE is working with schools to support affected students, including deploying additional IT roving teams to schools and providing additional learning resources."

In a statement on its website on Monday, Mobile Guardian announced that it has “halted servers to prevent further disruption by the perpetrator” following the security incident.

The company reported being alerted to suspicious activity on its platform and detected unauthorized access to its system at 10 PM Singapore time on 4 August.

Mobile Guardian is currently investigating the breach, which has affected users globally, including in the United States, Europe, and Singapore.

“This led to a small percentage of devices being unenrolled from Mobile Guardian and remotely wiped,” the company said.

Mobile Guardian advised users to contact their local IT administrator to reactivate their devices.

Second Cybersecurity Breach for Mobile Guardian in Six Months

This incident marks the second cybersecurity breach involving Mobile Guardian in six months.

In April, the company’s user management portal in Surrey, Britain, was hacked, leading to a data leak of names and email addresses of parents and teachers from five primary schools and 122 secondary schools in Singapore.

Earlier, The Straits Times reported that a glitch in the Mobile Guardian app affected more than 1,000 students from at least five MOE secondary schools.

As early as 30 July, some students experienced issues with their iPads, such as being unable to turn them on or off, while others could not connect to Wi-Fi and received the error message: “Guided Access app unavailable. Please contact your administrator.”

MOE attributed this glitch to a human error in configuration by Mobile Guardian.