Background
A K–12 educational organization approached Retrobyte seeking guidance on how to strengthen its cybersecurity posture. Leadership was concerned about excessive internal IT privileges, potential unauthorized email access, and general vulnerabilities across their environment. Retrobyteproposed an internal penetration test along with a cybersecurity risk assessment using the CIS (Center for Internet Security) Controls framework.

The initial assessment revealed serious security gaps, including a lack of fundamental controls, excessive user permissions, more than 1,000 unique system vulnerabilities, and no mechanisms in place to detect indicators of compromise (IOCs) within the network.

​

The Challenge
It became evident that the organization required substantial improvements and a comprehensive cybersecurity overhaul. To support this effort, Retrobyte provided an extended engagement that included one year of quarterly vulnerability scans and a bank of remediation hours.

Unfortunately, partway through the engagement, the organization experienced a ransomware attack—exploiting one of the exact vulnerabilities previously flagged for remediation. The internal IT team had failed to address this critical weakness, leading to the breach.

​

The Solution
Retrobyte immediately mobilized to assist with the incident, guiding the organization to contact insurance and identify incident response partners which resulted in the exploited attack vector being remediated. Fortunately, the organization was able to recover from the event without any data loss or long-term operational damage, thanks to functioning backups and containment efforts.

Following the incident, the organization made key changes—replacing the head of IT and partnering with a Managed Service Provider (MSP) and Managed Security Services Provider (MSSP). Retrobyte worked closely with all parties to support the transition and used the allocated remediation hours to help draft and implement foundational cybersecurity policies, including a comprehensive Incident Response Plan that defined roles and responsibilities across all stakeholders.

​

The Outcome
Retrobyte guided the organization from an insecure and high-risk environment through a breach recovery and into a modern, secure operating posture. Our continued partnership includes annual assessments to ensure the organization remains resilient against evolving threats.

​

Why Retrobyte?
This case demonstrates our ability to not only identify and communicate risks, but to respond effectively during a crisis, and help clients build long-term security maturity. Our team is committed to protecting educational institutions by offering scalable cybersecurity services that match their unique needs and resource constraints.