ACT cancels several college entrance exams following test leak

Test leak is the latest in a series of data breaches for non-profit

ACT cancels several college entrance exams following test leak

Non-Profits & Charities

By Lyle Adriano

The need for cyber insurance is now even shining brightly among the non-profit community after Iowa-based nonprofit ACT, known for producing a proprietary college entrance exam, canceled an ACT exam scheduled for Saturday at several of its international testing centers, citing a breach of the testing materials.

The organization could not give any specifics as to how the test materials were leaked because the breach is still under investigation.

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A spokesperson said that ACT had informed affected students and sent them instructions on how to reschedule their test.

Spokesman Ed Colby also told Reuters in an email that the breach and cancellations were confined only to specific international test centers.

ACT added that it was hard at work rescheduling tests set for Saturday in states affected by Hurricanes Harvey and Irma, such as Texas, Louisiana, and Florida.

“This has been a huge effort, and our goal has been to make sure that every single student in those impacted areas can cross the ACT test off their list of worries, as so many of them have much bigger issues to deal with now,” Colby explained.

In the past year, ACT has sustained a number of major security breaches. Following the October sitting of the exam, ACT had to cancel scores for an undisclosed number of students in Asia and Oceania on the writing section of the test due to a leak. And in June, the exam was canceled for all participants in South Korea and Hong Kong due to another cybersecurity incident.


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