The District of Oak Bay is warning residents to monitor their bank accounts after the municipality’s online servers were hacked.
The municipality said its oakbay.ca website was attacked on July 22.
A preliminary review has not found any evidence that residents’ personal information had been compromised, but residents who use Oak Bay’s pre-authorized withdrawal system to pre-pay taxes are being urged to contact their banks for advice.
The computer systems used do not store social insurance numbers, driver’s licence numbers, or credit or debit card numbers, but do contain the bank account numbers of about 1,500 residents as well as names and addresses.
A letter posted to the district’s website said residents using the MyDistrict system, used for tax, utility, bylaw notices, dog and business licence information, need to reset their passwords and security questions.
Oak Bay is investigating the reason for the 11-day delay between when the system was hacked and the official notice being released Friday.
“There was a delay here, I don’t know the reason and I’ve asked for an investigative report from our chief administrative officer to find out why there was a delay,” said Mayor Nils Jensen.
Five other municipalities — West Vancouver, Abbtsford, Port Moody, Maple Ridge and Whistler — had their sites hacked in the same time frame.
The Oak Bay server was replaced on July 23 and an independent security consultant is investigating the breach.
“We take this very seriously and will move forward to make sure this doesn’t happen again,” Jensen said.
