Fortura•Industries
Education & Research
In education and research, cyber attacks don’t just lock up systems. They interrupt learning and leak the ideas you haven’t published yet.
Schools, universities, TAFEs, training providers and research institutes across Australia and New Zealand have become fully digital operations: learning platforms, online assessments, research data lakes, student information systems, cloud HR and finance, and a sprawling ecosystem of EdTech and collaboration tools.
Attackers see a sector that:
- Holds identity data on millions of students, staff and alumni
- Manages valuable intellectual property and sensitive research
- Operates with tight budgets and diverse, decentralised IT
- Has to keep the doors open, even when under attack
In 2025, IBM found the global average cost of a data breach across sectors was USD 4.44 million—the first decline in five years—driven largely by faster detection and AI-assisted defence in better-resourced organisations.
Comparitech research shows 251 ransomware attacks on schools, colleges and universities worldwide in 2025—similar in number to 2024—but records known to be breached jumped to almost 3.96 million, up 27% on the previous year.
Major higher-education incidents like the 2025 University of Phoenix breach affecting an estimated 3.5 million people after a zero-day exploit show how a single event can dominate headlines and erode trust in digital learning.
Fortura exists so that your institution doesn’t become the next case study.
