Canada is facing an unprecedented surge in cyberattacks, with incidents targeting everything from government agencies and healthcare providers to schools and utilities. If you run a business in Canada, understanding these threats and how to defend against them is more important than ever, in this blog we will discuss the latest cyberattacks in Canada and how to avoid them.
The 10 Most Recent High-Profile Cyberattacks in Canada
Here’s a snapshot of major cyber incidents reported in the last year:
- Nova Scotia Power & Emera (April 2025): A disruptive cyberattack shut down IT systems and disrupted customer service, though power supply was not affected
- RCMP Data Breach (February 2025): The Royal Canadian Mounted Police suffered a supply chain attack, compromising sensitive systems and causing operational disruptions
- Ganong Bros. Ransomware (February 2025): The New Brunswick-based chocolate maker had production halted by ransomware
- Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board (January 2025): A cyberattack disrupted IT systems across multiple schools
- Brunswick Health Group (March 2025): A security breach affected patient data and care delivery
- OPSEU & Limestone District School Board (April 2025): Both organizations reported cyber incidents affecting operations
- Visionary Holdings (May 2025): The Toronto company was compromised, exposing risks for digital-first SMBs
- Alamos Gold (January 2024): The mining company in Toronto suffered a cyberattack, highlighting risks in the resource sector
- Manitoba Justice (December 2024): A provincial government service provider was hit, affecting justice services in Manitoba
- Pembina Trails School Division (December 2024): A cyberattack targeted school administration in Winnipeg
These attacks underline a critical message: No industry is off-limits. Whether you’re in manufacturing, healthcare, education, or energy, your organization could be a target
Why Are Cyberattacks Increasing in Canada?
- Ransomware remains the top threat: Attackers are targeting critical infrastructure, demanding high ransoms, and causing business disruptions
- Supply chain vulnerabilities: Even trusted third-party providers can be entry points for attackers, as seen in the RCMP breach
- State-sponsored threats: Countries like China and Russia are increasingly aggressive, targeting government and business networks for espionage and sabotage
- Cybercrime-as-a-service: Criminals now offer hacking tools and services for hire, making attacks easier and more frequent
How Can Any Company Avoid Most Cyberattacks?
You don’t need to be a tech expert to protect your business. Here are practical, non-technical steps every company should take:
- Educate Your Team: Train staff to spot phishing emails and suspicious links. Human error is often the easiest way in for attackers
- Update Software Regularly: Many attacks exploit outdated programs. Enable automatic updates wherever possible
- Use Strong Passwords: Require unique, complex passwords and consider two-factor authentication for all accounts
- Back Up Your Data: Regularly back up important files to a secure, offsite location. This can save your business if ransomware strikes
- Review Vendor Security: Make sure your suppliers and partners follow good cybersecurity practices, since their weaknesses can become your problem
- Have a Response Plan: Know what to do if you’re attacked—who to call, how to isolate affected systems, and how to notify customers
The Bottom Line: Every Business Is a Target
Cyberattacks in Canada are not just a problem for big companies or government agencies. Small and medium businesses are increasingly in the crosshairs, often because they have fewer resources and less robust defenses
Need Help Protecting Your Business?
At Secur-IT Data Solutions, we specialize in helping Canadian organizations build practical, effective cybersecurity plans. Whether you need staff training, security assessments, or a full incident response plan, our team is here to help you stay safe—without the jargon.
Protect your business before it’s too late. Contact us today to get started on your cybersecurity plan.
A defensive baseline that addresses most of these attacks
Across the incidents affecting Canadian organizations, the entry points repeat far more than the headlines suggest. A small set of controls addresses the large majority of them.
- Multi factor authentication on email, remote access and administrative accounts. Phishing and credential stuffing remain the most common way in, and this is the control that blunts both.
- Patch internet facing systems quickly. Anything reachable from outside, especially VPN appliances, firewalls and web applications, needs a short and enforced patch window.
- Offline and tested backups. Ransomware operators look for backups first. A copy that cannot be reached from the production network, restored on a schedule to prove it works, is what turns a catastrophe into a bad week.
- Endpoint detection with somebody watching it. The tool matters less than whether an alert at three in the morning reaches a human who can act.
- Segment the network. Flat networks are why one compromised laptop becomes an organization wide incident. Separating servers, workstations and any operational technology limits how far an intruder gets.
- Train people on what current phishing looks like, including the fact that attackers now use correct grammar, real branding and details taken from previous breaches.
Sector matters less than people assume. Schools, municipalities, clinics and manufacturers get hit through the same handful of doors, because attackers scan for exposure rather than choosing victims by industry. That is encouraging, because it means a modest and well chosen set of controls covers most of the realistic risk.
Where smaller organizations should spend first
If the list above is more than you can take on at once, the sequencing that delivers the most risk reduction per hour is consistent across the Canadian organizations we work with.
Start with identity, because that is how attackers get in. Multi factor authentication on email and remote access, administrative accounts separated from daily accounts, and departed staff removed promptly. Then move to recovery, because that determines how bad an incident becomes. One offline backup copy and a restore you have actually timed. Only then move to detection, because monitoring is worth little if the first two layers are missing and worth a great deal once they are in place.
Skipping to detection is the common mistake. Buying a monitoring product while administrators still share a password means paying to watch an attack that better identity hygiene would have prevented.
How Secur-IT Data Solutions can help
We help Canadian organizations put this baseline in place and then keep it in place, which is the harder half. For businesses without an internal security team, our managed service covers the monitoring and response so alerts reach someone who can act on them out of hours. We work with organizations across Toronto and the GTA as their managed security provider, and we are happy to start with a conversation rather than a quote. Get in touch with our team and we will tell you honestly whether this is something you need help with or something you can close yourself.
Krikor Tengerian is the CEO and founder of Secur-IT Data Solutions, a Toronto-based cybersecurity firm focused on helping Canadian organizations secure their infrastructure and critical systems. With over 25 years of experience across cybersecurity and IT infrastructure, he has supported organizations in hardening networks, protecting critical workloads, and aligning security controls with business and regulatory requirements.
Krikor actively shapes the direction and themes of Secur-IT’s educational content, collaborating with AI tools to structure, refine, and expand articles while providing the real-world context, use cases, and review to keep them accurate and practical for readers. He regularly shares insights on OT security, threat detection, incident response, and Canadian cybersecurity compliance to help industrial and commercial organizations better understand and reduce their cyber risk.
