Committee to discuss NS Power breach that allowed theft of 280,000 customers’ data

CITYnews halifax / By The Canadian Press

A provincial legislative committee is scheduled to meet today to discuss the recent Nova Scotia Power cybersecurity breach that allowed cyber-thieves access to data from 280,000 customers.

The privately owned utility’s CEO and other senior staff with Nova Scotia Power were called as witnesses to the standing committee on public accounts, which is set to meet this morning.

Company CEO Peter Gregg has previously said the data of about 280,000 Nova Scotia Power customers was breached in a ransomware attack — which is more than half of their total customers.

The breach of the customer records was first reported in late April, and the company later indicated the first breach was detected in mid-March.

Related:

• Theft of NS Power customer data is likely ransomware attack: security experts
• Federal privacy czar starts probe into theft of customer data from Nova Scotia Power
• Thieves gain access to about 140,000 social insurance numbers in NS Power database

Gregg said the social insurance numbers of up to 140,000 customers had been collected by the utility, and therefore could have been accessed in the breach.

He says Nova Scotia Power gathered these social insurance numbers as a way to authenticate customers’ identities in cases where multiple customers have the same name, but social insurance numbers aren’t required from its customers and were offered voluntarily.

The federal privacy commissioner has launched an investigation into a ransomware attack, with Philippe Dufresne saying in a statement last week he started the probe after receiving complaints about the security breach the utility reported in late April.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 4, 2025.