Around 1,000 Scottish schools sent hoax threat emails on Wednesday 11 November
Police Scotland says the messages are hoaxes and there is no need to evacuate schools or keep children at home. Some schools in Perth and Kinross, Fife and Inverclyde were evacuated.
File image of a secondary school in Inverclyde, one of the council areas where some schools were evacuated. · Photograph: Thomas Nugent (CC BY-SA 2.0)
Around a thousand schools across Scotland received a threatening email on Wednesday 11 November 2026, which Police Scotland is treating as a hoax.
The force said the messages were also sent to schools across the UK, and that there is nothing to suggest they represent a credible threat, in a statement from Assistant Chief Constable Mark Sutherland.
Should schools be evacuated?
No, according to Police Scotland. ACC Sutherland said: "Our advice is that there is no requirement to evacuate schools or keep children away from education based solely on the content of the emails."
He said the emails had been sent widely to distribution lists across the UK and Northern Ireland, and that the force's assessment "remains that they do not represent a credible threat".
Which schools were affected?
Around a thousand schools in Scotland received the email, police said. Some schools in areas including Perth and Kinross, Fife and Inverclyde were evacuated, according to STV News. Police have not published a list of the schools that received the message.
What have the police said?
Police say the messages were assessed immediately. ACC Sutherland said: "These messages were immediately assessed and we are treating them as hoaxes. Our enquiries have established that there is nothing to suggest that they represent a credible threat or that there is any wider threat to the public."
He added: "We understand how distressing messages of this nature can be for pupils, parents, carers and school staff, and the concern they can understandably cause."
Has this happened before?
Yes. Schools across Scotland, including some in Glasgow, received hoax email threats on Monday 19 October 2026. The Daily Scot reported at the time that attendance fell sharply the following day, with Glasgow City Council saying some of its schools had 50% fewer pupils than normal.
What happens next?
Police Scotland's Cyber and Fraud Unit is carrying out what the force calls "extensive enquiries" to establish the source, working with law enforcement partners across the UK and internationally. Parents should follow updates from their child's school and local council. This story is accurate as of Wednesday evening.