TTC says personal info accessed in cyber attack

Toronto’s public transit authority says it now believes the personal information from up to 25,000 employees, former transit employees and pensioners was stolen in a ransomware attack last month.

The Toronto Transit Commission, which operates the city’s bus, subway, streetcar and paratransit services, says names, addresses and Social Insurance Numbers were taken although it says there is no evidence any of the information has been misused.

The TTC says it is notifying affected individuals and will provide them with three years of credit monitoring and identity theft protection through TransUnion.

The transit authority is investigating whether customers and vendors were also affected by the sophisticated incident.

TTC chief executive Rick Leary says the commission has been working day and night since it initially announced the cyberattack on Oct. 29 to get its services back online and gain a clearer understanding about the breadth of the incident.

The incident resulted in several TTC servers being encrypted and locked, resulting in the loss of its Vision system, vehicle arrival information, online Wheel-Trans booking systems and external network connectivity including email.

“What we know about the threat actors in this case is that they belong to an extremely well-organized enterprise. On behalf of the entire organization, I want to express my deep regret that this has occurred to everyone who may be impacted,” Leary said in a statement.

More information and updates can be found at www.ttc.ca/cyberinfo2021.

The TTC provides public transit service for up to 1.7 million people every weekday in Toronto and surrounding municipalities.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2021.