Learning Management System Blues

Canvas is back online, but questions — and final exam disruptions — linger

This is but one of many articles about the recent attack on the Canvas learning management system (LMS) which took Canvas offline for the thousands of universities which use the LMS. The attack isn't especially special or even notable, but the level of unpreparedness Canvas users demonstrated for an attack like this is striking. That the attack paralyzed so many universities and faculty is a perfect example of a severe and thoughtless lack of technological foresight.

Congress investigates Canvas breach as company pays ransom

I have zero sympathy for Instructure (the company which runs the Canvas LMS), but I have less sympathy (meaning negative sympathy) for the repulsive and dimwitted fascist chair of the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Homeland Security who is obviously using the attack on the Canvas LMS as a publicity stunt. After all, this chair is one of the incompetent Republican creeps who is responsible for severely degrading the cybersecurity work of the federal government since the fascists took power.

The idea of an LMS is an idea I've always found to be offensive and one that fosters intellectual mediocrity. Learning isn't something to be managed, and to attempt to enclose learning in a severely limited system is the same as trying to fit an ocean into a thimble.

A best practice is for faculty to avoid using a university's LMS as much as possible. This easiest task is to host all course materials outside the LMS. There are legal and safe ways of getting around posting grades on an LMS. The hardest thing to do is to not use the LMS for testing, but it is possible to do so without causing legal problems.

It is safe, and probably correct, to assume that the LMS used by a university sucks big time and will inevitably screw over teachers and students. Figuring out how to keep a course functioning when that happens is good planning. It is also a lot of fun.

Nobody believes the 'criminals and scumbags' who hacked Canvas really deleted stolen student data

Instructure claims that the criminals who stole a ton of data from the Canvas LMS have now deleted that data. No one else believes this claim, and I doubt that Instructure believes it.

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Author: Flower Snark
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