Student Academic Record Systems and their Security Issues

Student academic records are an invaluable resource for universities and colleges worldwide, yet, their safekeeping is still a major concern for many of these institutions. The security measures currently applied to protect academic record systems are deemed unsatisfactory. This paper surveys the security issues relating to students’ academic records delving into existing students’ academic records systems, cybersecurity challenges and measures to deal with the security concerns. The paper proposes a practical security model, the PIEM model, to address these security issues aimed at empowering academic institutions to build and maintain strongly protected academic record systems for capturing, storing and retrieving student academic data. The work underscores the urgent need of educational institutions to exert extra efforts to securely maintain students’ academic records and facilitate easy access and use by the various educational actors.