Identities stolen after Interior Health data breach

Photo: Colin Dacre

Penticton General Hospital

Personal employee information stolen during a data breach at Interior Health has been used to hack CRA accounts and steal identities.

According to the CBC’s Fifth Estate, criminals have put information from the breach—disclosed by Interior Health in March 2024—to nefarious use.

The public broadcaster reported this week that at least seven current or former staff of Interior Health are now stolen identity victims after their personal information showed up in a leaked database of 28,000 IH employees.

Interior Health asked last year for anyone who worked for them from 2003 to 2009 to get in touch with them to determine if their data—including SIN numbers, dates of birth, addresses and phone numbers—was stolen.

The data breach became known in January 2024 when a document related to the leak was discovered during a Vernon RCMP investigation.

In a statement to Castanet this week, responding to the Fifth Estate reporting, Interior Health says “every effort has been made to connect with previous employees.”

“Technical experts tell us that this information is likely from 2009. Since 2009, IH has made significant security upgrades to their systems,” the health authority said.

“In addition to working closely with the RCMP, IH hired external security experts to review the situation and periodically scan the dark web. These scans have not located this information on the dark web.”

Interior Health says they still have not been able to determine where the leaked information came from, only saying the RCMP is still investigating.

“We urge anyone with additional information to bring it forward to the RCMP,” IH said.

The Nelson Police Department announced in February that a resident of the community had been getting harassed by fraudsters after their information was leaked in the IH leak.