20 March 2026

Some of our students have received a message in which they are supposedly asked by the university to transfer a sum of money to a foreign bank account. The message claimes that if you do not do this, your university account will be blocked.

This is NOT a genuine message from the university, but very likely a case of phishing. Do not respond to this message under any circumstances, do not send an email to the address mentioned, and certainly do not transfer any money.

The university is currently investigating how this could have happened. It is possible that a handful of accounts have been hacked and that the message was sent from one or more of these accounts. As soon as we have more information, we will inform you of these developments.

Have you already responded to the sender’s request? Please contact the ISCC helpdesk of Leiden University: 071 527 8888

For more information, please see the Don't be fooled by phishing page.