Student, Communication Specialist Arrested In ERAU Security Breach

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Daytona Beach, FL - A year long investigation headed by the FBI with the assistance of Daytona Beach police leads to the arrest of an Embry-Riddle student and an ERAU Communications Specialist.

According to the report, the Federal Bureau of Investigation office in Jacksonville began looking into a security breach at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University (November 2017), with Daytona Beach Police Department's Advanced Technology & Cyber Crimes Unit joining the investigation just two months ago.

That investigation led to the arrests of 27-year-old Kevin Scott, a student at ERAU, and 34-year-old Jeanette Barott, a communications specialist at ERAU, this morning (November 29th).

The report says that on November 7th, 2017, an Information Security Analyst with ERAU noticed malicious file events, indicating that a tool associated with password theft had attempted to execute on a computer lab system. The tool was subsequently blocked.

One student was pointed out to security, when questioned the student said that they had used the computer next to the one that was triggered, and only returned to the lab to retrieve a drink he believed he left behind.

On November 12th, 2017, IT security found events on the computer that showed a correlation between the suspect's login, and the activity associated with compromised accounts on the server. The suspect would then determined to be Scott based on the username, "scottk2," that was used to log into the computer.

The next day, security would receive a phone call from an FBI Agent working in Jacksonville, saying that the agency would begin to investigate the event.

November 22nd, 2017, IT Security finished a review of Scott's ERAU email account, showing several emails of interest being found.

One of the email threads found was sent from an Electrical Engineering professor at ERAU, discussing administrative rights.

The professor asked why Scott needed administrator access on the computers, to which Scott then began to berate ERAU IT, saying possible open attack vectors were created by them.

It should be noted that ERAU IT has long understood the risks associated with local administrative acces and has been working with the university to remove the access.

On May 22nd, 2018, the FBI Office in Jacksonville executed a search warrant at Scott's apartment, seizing a number of laptops, hard drives and computers.

Then, this morning DBPD arrested Scott, and communications specialist Barott after tying her into the breach along with Scott.

Scott was arrested at his home while Barott was arrested on campus.

Both Scott and Barott are charged with computer fraud with damage more than $5,000. Both are held on $10,000 bond.