Harvard University has begun notifying about 10,000 applicants to its Graduate School of Arts and Sciences for fall 2007 that their personal information might have been compromised in a hack into one of its servers, reports Computerworld.

The university decided to warn applicants of the breach, though its initial investigation suggested the information had not been accessed. Campus newspaper The Harvard Crimson, though, quotes university CIO Daniel Moriarty saying that after further investigation, he can't be sure no information was accessed or disseminated.

The university is providing one year's worth of free credit monitoring services to about 6,600 of the applicants because their Social Security numbers were among the information involved.

The hack, discovered in February, is believed to be the work of an outsider.