The federal privacy watchdog says it has discontinued the investigation into a cybersecurity breach involving a student information system used across Canada, citing its satisfaction with the company’s response and commitment to added security measures. Privacy commissioner Philippe Dufresne says the probe was launched in February after his office received a breach report from U.S.-based […]

Australian airline Qantas said Wednesday that a hacker made off with a trove of customers’ personal data including passenger names, emails, phone numbers, birth dates and frequent flyer numbers. The company said in a statement that a cybercriminal targeted one of its call centers on Monday and gained access to a third-party customer service platform […]

NEW YORK (AP) — A politically motivated hacker breached Columbia University’s data systems last week, stealing troves of student documents while briefly shutting down the school’s computer systems, a university official said. The June 24 cyberattack prompted widespread network outages on campus, locking students and staff out of their email accounts, coursework and video conference […]

Ontario is investigating an alleged breach of 200,000 home care patients’ personal health data, Health Minister Sylvia Jones said Friday. Ontario Health atHome, the provincial agency co-ordinating home and community care, said late Friday afternoon that one of its vendors informed the agency that it had experienced a cybersecurity attack and a breach of its […]

Inadequate security measures opened the door to a data breach discovered two years ago at genetic testing company 23andMe, Canada’s privacy watchdog says. Privacy commissioner Philippe Dufresne and U.K. information commissioner John Edwards released the findings from their joint investigation of the breach, which affected almost seven million people, including nearly 320,000 in Canada. Dufresne […]

Provincial politicians took aim at Nova Scotia Power during a legislative committee meeting this morning, saying the utility owes ratepayers answers after a cybersecurity breach gave thieves access to data belonging to 280,000 customers. The utility’s CEO and other staff were grilled by the public accounts committee about how the breach happened and what the […]

Nova Scotia Power’s CEO says up to 140,000 social insurance numbers could have been stolen by cyber-thieves who recently hacked into the utility’s customer records. Peter Gregg said in an interview Thursday that the privately owned utility collected the numbers from customers to authenticate their identities. “If there are a number of John MacDonalds, it […]

The federal privacy commissioner has launched an investigation into a ransomware attack that led to the theft of personal information belonging to 280,000 customers of Nova Scotia’s electric utility. Privately owned Nova Scotia Power confirmed last week that hackers stole the data and published it on the dark web. Privacy commissioner Philippe Dufresne said in […]

Nova Scotia Power confirmed on Friday what cybersecurity experts have suspected for weeks — that it was the victim of a ransomware attack. In an update posted to its website, the private utility said that no payment was made to the person or group behind the “sophisticated” attack. It refused to pay the ransom, it […]

Nova Scotia’s electric utility says data stolen from its customers includes credit histories, social insurance numbers and information on driver’s licences and bank accounts. In an update today, Nova Scotia Power says some customers’ names, ages, phone numbers, as well as email, mailing and service addresses may have also been taken. The utility’s release says […]

Canada’s largest school board says it has received a ransom demand over student data that was stolen last December, even though the company behind the affected software paid ransom in hopes of securing that information.  The Toronto District School Board said in a letter to parents and caregivers on Wednesday that it recently learned the […]

Nova Scotia’s electric utility says personal information belonging to some customers was taken during a recent cybersecurity breach. In a statement, Nova Scotia Power says the theft occurred last Friday when the privately owned company detected unusual activity on its network. At the time, the utility said there was unauthorized access into certain parts of […]