Ontario city 'regrets' exposing hundreds of voter identities in email privacy breach

A person can be seen behind a voting screen in this file photo. (CTV News Toronto)

The City of Hamilton says it "regrets" exposing the names and email addresses of hundreds of registered voters in a privacy breach Thursday.

The breach impacted approximately 450 individuals, the city said in a statement provided Friday, all of whom had registered to use the Vote by Mail process.

“Multiple email addresses were inadvertently entered in the to: line of the email instead of the bcc: line, exposing email addresses to all recipients of the email message,” the city said.

In a follow-up email sent to the original recipients Thursday, the city said “immediate steps were taken to recall the message, however, the email was not successfully recalled by all of the recipients.”

“If you received the original message, please delete it from both your inbox and deleted folders.”

On Friday, the city said it “regrets” the error and will reach out to the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario Friday to notify them of the breach.

Any privacy complaints regarding this incident can be lodged by calling 905-546-2424 ext. 2743 or emailing the city clerk at [e-mail]