LifeLabs, a laboratory test company, confirmed Tuesday it charged a ransom to protect information for Canadians that was hacked at the end of October in a data breach.
Hackers have accessed personal information from an unknown number of the 15 million Canadian users of the organization, primarily in Ontario and British Columbia. Health card numbers, names, email addresses, logins, passwords and birth dates were included in the information.
The company based in Toronto declined to say how much money was spent to protect the information.
For 2016 and earlier, the corrupted test results are. LifeLabs said there was no proof that other jurisdictions, apart from Ontario, had links to information.
LifeLabs said cyber security companies have confirmed that the threat to consumers is small and that as part of their inquiries they have not seen any public disclosure of customer data.
The business said it reported the threat to the Privacy Commissioner and took steps to improve its digital defenses. It offers a free year of protection for customers that includes dark web monitoring and insurance for identity theft.