An engineer bought a prison laptop on eBay. Then 1,200 incarcerated students lost their devices. - Open Campus
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Students said they were given little information about when and if the devices would be returned, and many wondered if they’d lose access to the work they saved.

Zhang, an electrical engineer in Boston, decided to post about trying to unlock his Justice Tech Solutions Securebook 5 on the social platform X. The thread went viral — also catching the attention of Washington corrections officials, who have used the device for college programming since 2020.

Of particular concern was an article about Zhang’s thread published on a hacker website that shared the default password for the underlying software that starts the laptop’s operating system, presenting what the Department of Corrections considered a security concern.

The department then announced Thursday, five days after Zhang’s viral post, that it would collect all secure laptops from incarcerated students statewide “to provide an immediate system update.” By Saturday, corrections staff had collected around 1,200 laptops, spokesperson Chris Wright said in an email.

Wright confirmed no one incarcerated in Washington prisons had attempted to unlock their devices but said the decision was “made out of an abundance of caution.” It wasn’t immediately clear whether other states whose corrections departments use Securebook 5 laptops have also pulled the devices.

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e; updated the title due to popular demand

  • @PM_Your_Nudes_PleaseEnglish
    17•10 months ago

    Calling it a security breach is a bit of a stretch, to be fair. The company that issued them never changed the default BIOS password, so inmates could gain admin control over them if they wanted. Changing default passwords is like the most basic Help Desk 1 training.

    I can almost guarantee that the company is owned by someone who also has direct ties to the prison’s leadership, and they spun up the corporation just to issue (and profit from) the laptops. Because there’s no way that an experienced IT team would allow 1200 laptops to walk out the door with default passwords.

    • LazaroFilmEnglish
      -3•10 months ago

      Having root access to that computer means they can do a lot of throngs they aren’t supposed to. I fail to see this as anything but a security breach for this.

      • Pup BiruEnglish
        3•10 months ago

        i’d say that it’s a security vulnerability, but breach implies it’s been used

        • LazaroFilmEnglish
          1•10 months ago

          I see. That makes sense.