HALIFAX — Nova Scotia Power’s CEO says up to 140,000 social insurance numbers could have been stolen by cyber-thieves who recently hacked into the utility’s customer records.

Peter Gregg said in an interview today that the privately owned utility collected the numbers from customers to authenticate their identities.

He says social insurance numbers were in about half of the 280,000 customer records breached by cyber-criminals and released onto the dark web.

The breach was first reported in late April.

Cybersecurity expert Claudiu Popa says it’s worth asking why the company would need this kind of personal information.

The founder of the non-profit group KnowledgeFlow says there are less risky ways of identifying customers.

The federal government’s website says each nine-digit number represents a unique identifier for work applications and government records, and it advises people not to share the number unless it’s legally required.

Thieves can use the number to commit fraud, such as illegally accessing government benefits and tax refunds.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 29, 2025.

The Canadian Press