A warning letter is being mailed out to 271 drivers who registered for the new Port Mann Bridge tolling system after a potential security breach.
The affected motorists, who represent a small fraction of the roughly 50,000 who have signed up for the TReO toll stickers, were asked for personal information such as their home address, license plate number and credit card number while speaking to a customer service representative from a Coquitlam call centre.
But Transportation Investment Corporation CEO Mike Proudfoot says the employee did not have authorization to request such information, and that Mounties are now in the process of investigating whether the accounts were compromised.
“What I can tell you is that this individual is not who he claimed to be when he was hired. As a result of the incident I’ve asked the toll operator to conduct a full review,” Proudfoot said.
The company says its hiring process includes interviews, reference checks and a criminal record check, but Proudfoot says the individual “took deliberate steps to circumvent that.”
The affected users will be contacted shortly with a letter, and the province says it is also setting up a help line to offer further information.
The employee was fired immediately after news about the phone calls came to light, and Mounties confirm they arrested a person of interest without incident on Friday. He remains in custody.
Few details about the individual have been confirmed and police won’t say whether he has a criminal record. The breach is not believed to be connected to organized crime, however.
The government says new procedures have been implemented to prevent a similar situation from occurring, but no details have been provided about the changes.
A review of the potential security breach is also underway.
With a report from CTV British Columbia’s Julia Foy
