POLITICS
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November 4, 2026
Seventy percent of the internet is powered by a programming language called Hypertext Preprocessor (PHP), which—due to its prevalence in website programming across the globe—holds a majority of all the internet’s data. As disclosed in an emergency release from the PHP Foundation, an AI-based detector has revealed two critical memory-safety flaws in PHP that have led to cybersecurity attacks from “malicious” unknown sources across the globe. Experts are classifying this mass cybersecurity threat as “Black October.”
The National Security Agency (NSA) has suggested that any organization using private or sensitive information with a PHP website immediately take their work offline and patch their websites with PHP2Shell—an open-source, AI-based software patch. As a result, several foreign governments have restricted public web services and records and American hospitals have shut down critical technology in order to protect patient privacy.
Georgetown professor Dr. Elena Marchetti explained how the PHP vulnerability led to such extensive damage, saying, “When the interpreter that runs the code has a critical bug, every application sitting on top of it inherits the risk, regardless of which hosting panel or control software a site owner happens to use.”
In the face of “Black October,” the world’s most powerful organizations, such as the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), the NSA, and the European Union’s cybersecurity branch (ENISA), have committed to using the AI-backed PHP2Shell in combatting this cybersecurity crisis.
Some critics worry that using AI to solve this problem is adding fuel to the fire. AI may act as a multiplier that disproportionately benefits the attacker since, when AI reveals a PHP flaw or when an NSA-approved patch is issued, hackers can use their own AI to reverse-engineer the patch and create exploitations in the programs more efficiently. Moreover, AI solutions can broaden the vulnerabilities of the PHP within the hacker’s AI and can subsequently be used to weaponize the patch for its own advantage.
Even before “Black October,” AI was creeping into cybersecurity. In June, President Donald Trump signed Executive Order 14409, which replaced conventional cybersecurity controlled by public agencies with private tech companies that would broadly use AI in their programming patches. The order came in response to what American intelligence agencies deemed to be Iranian cyber attacks on American military bases.
Moreover, the current administration concluded that refusing to use AI in cybersecurity would leave the U.S. military at risk from foreign adversaries. Nevertheless, some attribute the consequences of “Black October” to the federal government’s lack of regulation over cybersecurity agencies and the vulnerabilities in PHP that AI patches ultimately revealed to hackers.
Universities have not escaped the consequences of these cyber attacks: Amherst College has since revoked all access to its student learning management systems, Duke University has pulled many of their university-hosted public websites, and Northwestern University has reported disruptions for those attempting to apply to the school.
Although Notre Dame has not reported any recent cybersecurity attacks related to PHP and has not joined the elite universities contributing to the PHP2Shell, the university’s Canvas page was attacked last semester during the final weeks of school, which disrupted final exams, altered studying hours, and created an outage that lasted weeks.
Unlike the case in “Black October” where the hackers are still unknown, Notre Dame’s hackers were identified as the ShinyHunters who attacked 9,000 other universities globally.
The Rover asked Tracy Weber, Notre Dame’s Vice President of Information Technology and the Chief Information Officer, how “Black October” has impacted Notre Dame’s data and how the university has approached cybersecurity attacks in the past.
Weber told the Rover, “Cybersecurity is a top priority for the University of Notre Dame. The threat landscape is always changing, and we’ve been investing in our people, processes and defenses for some time so that we’re ready when incidents like these happen. When the PHP vulnerabilities were identified, we activated our incident response process right away.”
Weber elaborated, “Per protocol, potentially affected systems were taken offline while our teams worked closely with system administrators across campus. Each system came back online only after it had been patched and validated. Our investigation found no evidence that University data was accessed or that our systems were compromised as a result of this vulnerability.”
Weber concluded by alluding to the concerns of AI involvement in cybersecurity, saying, “As for the future, AI is changing cybersecurity in both directions. Attackers are using it to move faster and at greater scale, and it’s also giving defenders powerful new ways to spot and respond to threats. We see AI as a tool that strengthens the work of our security professionals, and we’re thoughtfully exploring how it can help us protect the Notre Dame community.”
Raymond Webber is a junior philosophy major. His favorite hobby is going to Nantucket and referencing the Lacrosse Segue Finance Pipeline. Contact him at rwebber2@nd.edu.
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