(LifeSiteNews) — The Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) have charged and arrested two people, including a former Ontario government employee, over a severe data infringement of the province’s COVID-19 vaccine database.  

21-year-old Ayoub Sayid, who worked at the Ministry of Government and Consumer Services, along with 22-year-old Rahim Abdu were recently arrested over the data breach, which took place on November 16, 2021 and affected the personal information of about 360,000 people.

They both face criminal code charges for using a computer without authorization and if found guilty, could face a maximum of 10 years in prison. 

At the time, Sayid was working in a vaccine call center, the alleged location of the crime.

According to officials, the government is now contacting the 360,000 people whose vaccine records were impacted.

Trying to ease concern, Ontario’s Ministry of Public and Business Service Delivery said that in 95 percent of cases, “only names and/or phone numbers were impacted.” 

“Ontario’s COVID-19 vaccine booking system is regularly monitored and tested as part of the Ministry of Health’s cyber security protocols and we remain confident that the booking system continues to be a safe and secure tool for Ontarians to use,” added the ministry.

Officials say they were notified that something was wrong after people impacted by the data breach were sent spam messages. 

Ontario, like all provinces in Canada, introduced a COVID jab QR-code vaccine passport system in the fall of 2021, something users had to obtain online.

The vaccine passport allowed only those who had been “fully vaccinated” against COVID to access many parts of society, a policy that lasted until the spring of 2022 after pushback from citizens, conservative politicians, lawyers, and the well-known Freedom Convoy protest led to the axing of the apparatus.  

Privacy experts had warned that QR-code vaccine passport systems were vulnerable to attacks, and opened the doors for the mass surveillance of society.   

In fact, in August 2021, months before Ontario’s data breach, hackers were able to get the QR-code vaccine passports of the premier of Québec along with other politicians.  

In Alberta, a former New Democratic Party (NDP) and now-independent member of the legislative assembly (MLA) for Edmonton-South Thomas, Thomas Dang, recently pleaded guilty to hacking into the province’s COVID jab database. 

The hacking, according to recently unsealed court records, shows that Dang allegedly used someone else’s Alberta Healthcare number to search 1.78 million vaccine health records between September 19-23, 2021. 

Dang faces fines of $200,000 if found guilty, but has had the criminal charges against him rescinded.