MASON, Ohio — Mason High School students were "Zoom bombed" with hate speech and disturbing images during a panel held by the Black Student Union on Friday, according to the district.
The Zoom-held panel, focused on the Black experience in Mason, was suddenly bombed with messages "which included the use of profanity, gory video images and the N-word," a letter sent to parents from Mason City Schools said.
Leaders of the Black Student Union quickly ended the Zoom session and issued a new link to participants.
Since the incident on Friday, Mason City Schools said they began an investigation into the attack, which they said seemed to be coordinated and from at least three different intruding accounts.
The district worked with the Southwest Ohio Computer Association and dug through meeting log files. IP addresses of multiple unknown participants in the panel, which the district believe likely were the Zoom bombers, originated from other parts of the United States, and several international addresses were included.
"Our heart breaks that an important forum intended as a safe space for members of our Black community to share their experiences was compromised," the district wrote in the letter sent to parents. "Moving forward, all school-sponsored virtual events will require an online registration in order to try to prevent something like this from happening in the future."
Hate speech and images like the ones the students were bombarded with on Zoom "will not be tolerated," the district said.
