REPORT Confirms CRA Sloppy with Security :CRA SOTW
Alan Baggett
Taxman sloppy about security: report
OTTAWA — The people who safeguard the tax information of millions of
Canadians have been forgetting to lock the doors.
A new audit slams the Canada Revenue Agency for repeated failures to
maintain even basic security at seven key offices in Quebec and
Ontario, including two in Ottawa.
"Certain exterior and interior perimeter doors were not adequately
secured and deadbolts and other hardware were used inappropriately or
were missing," says the audit report from June.
All but one of the offices were faulted for the shoddy way doors were
locked. Keys, combination locks and key-cards were not properly
tracked, secured or used.
And at three offices, electronic alarm systems designed to thwart
intruders were defective, unarmed or missing altogether.
The blistering report notes this isn't the first time the tax-
collection agency has been cited for shoddy physical security at its
offices.
"Certain vulnerabilities were already noted during inspections . . .
over the last few years and had not yet been corrected," the report
notes.
Security inspectors fanned out between April 2007 and March of this
year, prodding and poking around the doors, gates, turnstiles and
windows of some of the agency's busiest offices. They also interviewed
the people responsible for local security.
Not only did the facilities frequently fail basic security tests, but
the employees in charge of security appeared to be clueless about the
standards they were required to maintain.
"Most security stakeholders interviewed by the internal auditors had
little knowledge of the security standards or equipment examined in
the audit," says the report.
"At some of the sites visited, employees who had left their security
positions were the only ones familiar with certain essential
functions."
Spokesmen for the agency did not respond to requests for comment and
information about the audit, including the addresses of the seven
offices. But the report says security officials have given themselves
until Sept. 30 next year to correct all the problems.
The Canada Revenue Agency last year reported numerous thefts and
losses of equipment at its facilities, including 25 laptops, 17
cellphones, six BlackBerries, five printers and a router.
Included among the stolen items were two video-surveillance cameras,
meant to deter thieves, together worth $8,244.
Another surveillance camera was stolen the year before, along with
$10,000 worth of metal bars and door handles.
The audit did not examine the security of the agency's electronic data
systems, which themselves have come under fire for breaches.
In 2004, for example, an audit found that laptops used outside the
office were not locked up properly and confidential information was
kept on computers that were vulnerable to hacking.
That report followed the 2003 theft of four computers from an agency
office in Laval, Que., containing the personal information of 120,000
Canadians.
The June audit, released this month, was budgeted for $32,000 in
travel costs and 6,000 hours of auditors' time.
The agency employs the equivalent of 38,000 workers and operates from
more than 100 offices across Canada.
Copyright © 2008 The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.
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