POLICE are investigating a “mindless” cyber attack on a secondary school after personal documents were apparently wiped from computer systems.

John Kyrle High School and Sixth Form headteacher Nigel Griffiths has written to parents and guardians saying data, including course work, appeared to have been destroyed in an act of “vandalism”.

He added: “There is no evidence that any information was taken from our system.

“Our investigations have confirmed this was not an act of theft or holding us to ransom, it was an act of targeted vandalism.

“The aim was to disrupt the good order of the school and, even worse, to upset students and staff.

“In the words of a reply I received on this matter from one of Her Majesty’s inspectors of Ofsted, it was ‘mindless’.”

He said the students were the Ross-on-Wye school’s “main priority”, and they were working with exam boards, the local education authority and other bodies, and GCSE and A-Level candidates would not have to repeat work that had been lost.

The IT attack, which police are said to be treating “extremely seriously”, first came to light on Monday, January 13, when the school was unable to access servers used to store different types of personal data about staff and pupils.

The data is thought to include pupil records, examination data, SEN (special educational needs) and safeguarding data.

“The security issue which has arisen, further to initial investigations, is the system has been accessed without authorisation,” said Mr Griffiths when he first alerted parents to the breach last week.

“Encryption has been applied which is currently preventing us from being able to access the server.

“There is currently, however, no evidence to suggest that any of the data stored on the server has been used, stolen or shared.

“It is clear this security incident is criminal in nature and investigations are already underway to identify the perpetrator and minimise any ongoing risk.”

In a follow-up statement to parents this week, the headteacher added: “We have acted closely with the police, our legal team and the Information Commissioner’s office.”

Herefordshire Council, the local education authority, was supporting the school, which has more than 800 pupils and is attended by many Forest youngsters, and Mr Griffiths has been in contact with many other county headteachers.

“I do not want students or staff in other schools to suffer in the way we have,” he said.

A West Mercia Police spokesperson confirmed: “Police were contacted on January 13 with reports of suspicious circumstances relating to the IT network at John Kyrle School, Ross-on-Wye.

“This has been passed to our Cybercrime team who are currently investigating this incident.”

Mr Griffiths added that school life was continuing as normal, with registration and classes unaffected by the security breach.

Recent events have included a “successful Year 11 parents’ evening” and two “extremely positive surveys with parents”, while a project group was in the process of being launched to look at building a new suite of science labs.

“There are always positives to take from every setback,” Mr Griffiths told parents.

“There has been an opportunity to test our culture. It is strong because of the fabulous students and staff at JKHS. I am grateful to them and to you for all the ongoing support.”