Key facts
- A message attributed to the alias DaggerElite appeared on the VCAA homepage banner on Wednesday evening.
- The hacker claimed to have sold exam papers to hundreds of students and downloaded a copy of 2026 exam papers.
- The VCAA said the claims were fabricated and designed for financial gain from anxious students.
- Go Ahead Lawyers said it did not access or distribute any exam papers and suspects its email address was spoofed.
- VCAA chief executive Andrew Smith said the likelihood exam papers could be downloaded from secure printers was very, very low.
- The VCE exam period runs from October 5 to November 18, with 24 exams remaining.
The Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority's website was hacked during the state's exam period, with a message attributed to someone using the alias "DaggerElite" appearing on the homepage banner on Wednesday evening. The message claimed exam papers had been sold to "hundreds of students" across the state and that a copy of 2026 exam papers had been downloaded from internal file servers.
A VCAA spokesperson strongly refuted the claims, which they said were "fabricated", adding there was "no evidence at all" that any VCE exams had been accessed or leaked. "These are false claims designed for financial gain from the exploitation of anxious students," the spokesperson said.
The hacker also claimed the exams had been sent to students via an email address belonging to law firm Go Ahead Lawyers, whose email security system they said had been hacked. A spokesperson for the firm said it was "not involved in the reported hacking incident involving the VCAA website" and "did not access or distribute any exam papers". "Our review to date has found no evidence of unauthorised access to our email systems," the spokesperson said, adding the firm suspected a third party may have spoofed its address.
The incident has been reported to Victoria police. On Thursday morning the VCAA website said it was "undergoing maintenance". VCAA chief executive Andrew Smith told ABC Radio Melbourne the authority was working to restore the site as a "matter of urgency" and said the likelihood exam papers could be downloaded from secure printers was "very, very low".
A Victorian government spokesperson said the VCAA had advised no exams had been accessed or leaked and that the VCE exams would continue as normal. The VCE exam period began on October 5 and runs until November 18, with 24 exams remaining, including physics, geography and politics.