Dear members of the Columbia Community,
Instructure, the parent company of Canvas/CourseWorks, the third-party vendor that provides Columbia’s learning management system, is experiencing a widespread outage related to a cybersecurity incident reported to the University yesterday evening. This outage is reportedly impacting more than 8,800 educational institutions around the world, and it has impacted our ability to access Canvas/CourseWorks. For clarity, this disruption stems from an incident at Instructure, and at this time, there is no indication of this affecting other Columbia University systems or data.
This outage may pose significant challenges to our faculty and students who are in the midst of or currently preparing for final exams. The University is working actively with schools to minimize academic disruption, create alternative mechanisms to prepare for and deliver exams, and provide appropriate flexibility during this period. Faculty and students will hear directly from their schools regarding specific next steps.
We appreciate the patience and understanding of our students, faculty, and staff as we work with Instructure to resolve this issue. Supporting our community remains our top priority. Further updates will be provided as more information becomes available.
Sincerely,
Angela V. Olinto
Provost, Rutherfurd Professor of Astronomy and Professor of Physics
Anne Sullivan
EVP for Finance and Information Technology
Rich Hall
Interim Vice President and CIO
