An unauthorized official sent a text message to more than 42,000 students, professors, and staff members using the University of Florida’s emergency-alert system on Tuesday night. The message contained cryptic words that left some people charging racism, and others afraid that the message hinted at some kind of danger.

Brendan Negron, a freshman at the university, was sitting with a friend on campus when both of them got the exact same text-message that said: “The monkey got out of the cage.” They asked around and soon realized that everyone they knew had received the same cryptic words from the same unknown telephone number.

“it was pretty scary at first,” said Mr. Negron. “My first reaction was that maybe it was some kind of threat.” Then his friend suggested that the message could be a reference to the swearing-in of America’s first African-American president, which took place just a few hours before the message arrived. Several other students thought the same thing and complained to university officials about what they perceived as a racial slur.

University of Florida officials now say that the message was sent by a former employee of Mobile Campus, the vendor that the university uses to operate the text-message alert service. The employee was trying to show off to a friend that he still had access to the university’s system when he accidentally sent the message, according to a statement from the university.

“It raises a concern for us that a former employee was able to still access the system,” said Stephen F. Orlando, a spokesman for the university, in an interview today. “Clearly that’s an issue that needs to be addressed and fixed.”

But Mr. Orlando stressed that no one had hacked into the system, and he said the university was working with Mobile Campus to keep any further unauthorized messages from going out.

Many colleges and universities have set up emergency-alert systems that can send messages to cell phones, but the University of Florida was one of the first to automatically add every student to the system. The majority of colleges have an opt-in policy, in which students and others must sign up to receive emergency alerts. As a result of the University of Florida’s policy, well over 80 percent of students are part of the system, which has 60,000 registered users.

While the mysterious “monkey” message was being sent, someone at Mobile Campus noticed it and shut down the system before everyone received it, said Mr. Orlando. Officials then disabled the system while they investigated the source of the message. Mr. Orlando said he did not know whether the alert system is back in operation yet.

Officials for Mobile Campus could not be reached for comment today.

The university’s police chief, Linda Stump, sent an e-mail message to all students yesterday explaining how the “monkey” message had been sent in error. “Please know that the university’s top priority in this matter remains safeguarding students’ and staff members’ private data, as well as the integrity of the text messaging system,” she said.

This is the first incident we’ve heard of in which a college’s emergency alert was used without authorization. —Jeffrey R. Young

Categories: Security