An application for a class-action lawsuit has been filed in the Quebec Superior Court against a Montreal-area school board after it circulated parents’ sensitive information.
On July 2, the Sir Wilfrid Laurier School Board sent an email to parents of children attending Rosemere High School, on the North Shore, with a document containing names, birth dates, social insurance numbers, phone numbers, email addresses, country of birth, emergency telephone numbers and contacts.
The lawsuit reportedly alleges negligence in protecting sensitive information.
“We are currently in talks with the victims and cybersecurity experts to assess the potential damages,” said a representative for Lambert Avocats, the law firm representing the parents.
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One of the parents of a high school student told CityNews seeing their own social insurance number and other confidential information, along with those of other parents, came as a shock.
“I reacted like everybody else probably would have, said, ‘Oh my God,’ and then I closed it up because I have this funny sense of don’t look at other people’s information,” they said. “And I texted a friend and said, ‘you’ll never believe this.’”
Among parents, there was a sense of frustration and anger about how confidential information was managed by the school board.
“I think the general feeling is, how is a document with so much sensitive information so easily attached to an email and not password protected or not safeguarded at a better level?” the parent told CityNews.
Along with anger, there was a feeling of vulnerability.
“Going forward, obviously, we will have to be cognizant and aware of the fact that this could be an issue,” they added. “If somebody out there chooses to do something unseemly with the information, nobody can control it.”
Shortly after the original email, the parents were sent a text message asking them not to open the email and delete it. They were also asked to sign a form confirming they have done so.
The parent told CityNews it was ironic the school board would ask them to safeguard the information after they shared it widely in the first place.
“You sent out all the information and now I have to sign a document saying I’m not going to do it. It was just a little bit odd,” they said.
Sir Wilfrid Laurier School Board chairperson James Di Sano said the incident would be reported to the provincial authorities as required by law.
Earlier this week, the school board announced it would pay for credit monitoring and identity protection for three years to all those affected by the privacy breach.
Di Sano also said the school board will implement measures to strengthen the processes.
