Woman accuses City of Calgary of compromising her safety following privacy breach

A Calgary female is accusing nan city of compromising her information aft it sent immoderate of her individual accusation to a complete stranger.

Kris Webber told Global News it each started erstwhile she challenged her property assessment astatine nan commencement of nan year. Webber felt nan worth assessed by nan metropolis acold exceeded what her location was really worth, truthful she sent successful an appeal. The city’s taxation section past sent her an email asking her to nonstop much information, including photos of nan wrong and extracurricular of her home.

Webber said she sewage each of nan basal accusation fresh and deed “reply all” — not knowing 1 of nan group connected nan email concatenation was not pinch nan city, but conscionable different resident.

“I sewage this very terse email from this man saying, ‘I don’t cognize who you are. I don’t cognize why I’m included connected this email,'” she said.

“My bosom conscionable stopped, and my tummy sunk.”

The unintended recipient went connected to show her to delete his email reside and that “under nan (Personal Information Protection Act ) I americium judge nan rules person been surgery and personification should beryllium fired.”

Webber said she understood nary of her financial accusation had been compromised, but what had been leaked she said was moreover worse.

“Just nan truth that he knows wherever I unrecorded now and he’s sewage nan pictures of nan wrong of my house, nan extracurricular of my house,” she pointed out. “If he wanted to travel complete and do immoderate malicious intent aliases something, he’s virtually sewage an outline of what my location looks like.

Webber contacted nan metropolis respective times to find retired really it had happened. She said she was told it was “not usually heard of” and that they were “confident that he’s going to delete nan email”.

Not contented pinch those answers, Webber yet called nan city’s state of accusation and privateness office to investigate. She said she yet sewage an reply months later stating nan privateness serviceman “can corroborate that a privateness breach did occur” and that recommendations were sent to nan metropolis to guarantee it didn’t hap again.

City of Calgary’s response

In a connection to Global News, nan city’s Assessment Tax squad said, “The City of Calgary Assessment & Tax acknowledges that a azygous privateness breach occurred connected January 10, 2024, which compromised nan individual accusation of 1 of our customers.

“We return privateness concerns earnestly astatine The City. Upon learning of nan breach, we took contiguous action to rectify nan correction and worked to guarantee that nan unintended recipient of nan individual accusation deleted it from their possession.”

The connection went connected to say, “The City’s Access to Information and Corporate Privacy agency launched a afloat reappraisal that wished nan privateness breach was a one-off incident caused by quality correction and followed up pinch nan customer. The City’s Assessment & Tax squad has learned from this correction and is implementing nan recommendations.

“We sincerely apologize for this correction and immoderate harm it mightiness person caused this individual.”

But Webber was not satisfied pinch nan statement.

“It’s conscionable astonishing that there’s not protocols already successful spot to forestall thing for illustration this from happening successful nan first place,” Webber said.

Cyber-security do’s and don’ts

University of Calgary cyber-security master Ryan Henry told Global News these types of incidents are unluckily “not astatine each unusual”.

“It’s usually a quality issue,” he said. “There’s tons of humans progressive and a batch of opportunities for group to make mistakes. Not everyone is ever ace trained successful really to grip confidential accusation particularly if that’s not a normal portion of their job.”

Henry added location are ways for institutions and companies to amended protect accusation including utilizing encrypted email services.

He said while these services whitethorn beryllium much inconvenient, they will often return nan correction retired of “reply all” situations. He besides suggested not utilizing email successful nan first spot erstwhile it comes to delicate accusation and alternatively employment a website requiring  individuals to log successful and participate their ain information.

As for nan city’s consequence to this correction which included asking nan unintended recipient to delete each messages, Henry said that’s not ever ideal.

“Most group are mostly bully group and won’t usage this benignant of accusation but that’s decidedly not thing you want to trust connected for information and privacy.”

Webber said she is still waiting for “her” apology.

“An apology mightiness beryllium bully from nan existent section that released my individual accusation to this gentleman,” she said.