Thousands of students across the country were unable to access Canvas on Thursday as schools responded to a cyber attack affecting many academic institutions.

At Latin, the inconvenience was doubled by approaching AP exams and finals, increasing stress on students as the school year comes to a close.

Virtually all classes at Latin use Canvas, and many had assignments open on the website when it went down.

Some users received a message on their dashboards saying that cybercrime group ShinyHunters had “breached Instructure,” the platform Canvas runs on. ShinyHunters has been involved in numerous incidents, including hacking Ticketmaster, Salesforce, and AT&T, among other companies.

Risk of exposed data is significant. According to the message, “Instructure still has until 12 May 2026 to contact.” The message also made an offer to individual institutions affected, proposing that they “consult with a cyber advisory firm and contact [ShinyHunters] privately to negotiate a settlement.”

Upper School Director Nick Baer wrote in an email that if a “student is unable to access Canvas, submit an assignment, or complete work,” they will “not be penalized.”

He also emphasized the importance of not trying to access Canvas until the issue is resolved and making sure to verify any emails or text messages claiming to be from the website.

The full scope of the disruption and whether any data has been released has not been determined.