MONTREAL – The Desjardins Group is now acknowledging a former employee who stole the personal data of 4.2 million members of financial co-operatives in Quebec also gained access to information for 1.8 million credit card holders, but it said none of that information has been provided to third parties.
"I want to be clear: nothing tells us that this data has been stolen," Desjardins Group CEO Guy Cormier told the Canadian Press. "It is only preventive that Desjardins wants to warn people."
As CUToday.info reported here, the breach was initially discovered in June. A former employee is alleged to have taken the data, which included includes names, addresses, birth dates, social insurance numbers, email addresses and information about transaction habits.
The updated information was released just a week after the departure of two senior Desjardins executives -- former chief operating officer Denis Berthiaume and Chadi Habib, senior vice president of information technology, Canadian Press reported.
Real Bellemare has been named as the new executive vice president and chief operating officer and is temporarily in charge of information technology with Desjardins Group.
Additional Allowances for Losses
Desjardins Group said of its credit card, insurance and wealth management members/customers will receive the same protections already offered to Desjardins members. In total, about eight million people will have access to the suite of initiatives, such as access to Equifax's credit monitoring service.
Desjardins reported it has added between $10 million and $15 million to the $70 million provision from earlier this year to cover the costs related to the leakage of personal data.
The incident is still being been investigated by the Quebec Provincial Police and the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada, while the Surete du Quebec is also pursuing a criminal investigation into the leak.