To our community and partners,

Thank you very much for your continued understanding and support of our school’s activities.

We have recently detected unauthorized access (malware infection exploiting a system vulnerability) on some of the web servers operated by our school. In response, we have performed an emergency shutdown of the affected servers, prioritizing the safety of our users. We sincerely apologize for any concern or inconvenience this may cause.

We would like to report on the current status and our subsequent actions as follows:

1. Incident Overview and Timeline

On January 27, 2026, we identified unauthorized behavior that exploited an inherent vulnerability in our website’s operation system (CI/CD tools). We immediately disconnected the affected servers from the network and conducted a detailed investigation.

2. Scope of Impact and Safety of Personal Information

Due to this incident, the following site was temporarily inaccessible:

Special Campaign Site (Note: The campaign period ended on January 31.)

Important Note Regarding Donation Information: Our investigation has confirmed that sensitive data, including donation records and credit card information, is managed on a completely separate system from the affected servers. Therefore, no data leakage or tampering has occurred. Please be assured that your information remains secure.

3. Future Measures

While we are currently working on restoration, we are not merely performing a simple recovery. To transition to a fundamentally more secure and high-performance environment, the affected services are currently set to “Under Maintenance.”

We take this incident very seriously and are committed to further strengthening our information security management systems. We appreciate your kind understanding.

Sincerely,

Asian Rural Insititute