‘Nothing is safe’: Manitoba First Nation chief says hackers diverted $200K in federal funds to outside account

Federal funds that were supposed to be transferred to a Manitoba First Nation were diverted to an outside bank account in an apparent hack, the community’s chief revealed Thursday.

Chief Dennis Pashe said an investigation is underway to find out what happened when a $200,000 transfer from Indigenous Services Canada was not deposited into Dakota Tipi First Nation’s account.

“We were wondering where our operating funds were.”

“The perpetrators… were able to divert money that was supposed to go to our community from an ISC account,” Pashe said. “We were wondering where our operating funds were. We put pressure on ISC to find out where the money was.”

Pashe said he did not yet have full details of what happened. He said emails were “falsified,” and officials were impersonated when the money was diverted.

“It doesn’t feel very good. Nothing is safe,” Pashe said. “The warning is everybody needs to keep an eye on their accounts. Everybody needs to do due diligence on their transactions.”

The incident also serves as a lesson for increased cybersecurity measures, he said.

Pashe said he believed the $200,000 transfer went to the wrong account in August, but a second transfer was flagged by a bank and blocked some time later.

He wouldn’t say how much money was supposed to be transferred the second time.

“It was a good sum. It was stopped, though,” Pashe said.

“Everybody needs to keep an eye on their accounts.”

He said ISC has taken the lead on the situation, which is being investigated by information technology experts. He did not know if police were notified.

The Free Press sought information from ISC Thursday morning; a spokeswoman indicated in the afternoon that the department would likely need more time to respond.

Dakota Tipi is located just outside Portage la Prairie, about 75 kilometres west of Winnipeg.

While details were limited, Toronto-based cybersecurity consultant Ritesh Kotak said no one is immune from cyber threats.

He said cybersecurity incidents serve as reminders to ensure proper controls are in place to protect systems or finances, and to verify and validate account-related requests received by email.

“These scams are becoming much more sophisticated,” he said.

“These scams are becoming much more sophisticated.”

Last week, Auditor General Karen Hogan raised concerns about “significant gaps” in the federal government’s cybersecurity services, monitoring and response during active attacks.

“As cyberattacks become more sophisticated, pervasive, and harmful, the federal government must continually bolster its defences,” Hogan wrote in her Oct. 21 report to Parliament.

Not all federal organizations were subject to the same security policies, which resulted in the inconsistent use of available cybersecurity services, the auditor general said.

chris.kitching@freepress.mb.ca