While I was travelling last month, I apparently missed an important news item. In light of this week’s reports of a significant breach and extortion attempt of Express Scripts, this earlier news release from the FBI in Indianapolis is particularly timely: Michael S. Welch, Special Agent in Charge of the Indianapolis Office of the Federal…
Category: Health Data
Pinellas Audit Reveals Confidential Files That Missed Shredder
Steven Girardi reports: Hundreds of confidential government documents have turned up in trash bags and garbage bins instead of being shredded as required by law, according to a Pinellas County audit. The documents from the county court houses, emergency medical services, the sheriff’s office, health and human services, the supervisor of elections office and other…
Article: What's Wrong with Health Privacy?
Abstract: This chapter seeks to identify some of the reasons why “privacy” remains so contentious. Here I suggest several possible answers ranging from “micro” issues such as what we understand by health privacy to more “macro” and operational issues as we seek to protect health information. First, lawyers have made consistent errors in the terminology…
Article: Assessing the Status of Medical Information in the Light of the UK Data Protection Act 1998
Abstract: This paper will consider the current privacy laws as applied to healthcare in the UK, taking into account the UK Data Protection Act 1998, which implements the European Data Protection Directive 95/46/EC. Whilst the data protection laws in the UK deals with the overall protection of an individual’s personal information, there are certain…
Express Scripts Warns of Potential Large Data Breach Tied to Threat
Express Scripts (Nasdaq:ESRX), one of the largest pharmacy benefit management companies in North America, today announced that it has received a letter from an unknown person or persons trying to extort money from the company by threatening to expose millions of the company’s patients’ records. The letter included personal information of 75 members, including their…
AU: Patients' private medical records on show
Sue Dunlevy reports: MEDICARE bureaucrats will get access to patients’ private medical records as part of a new crackdown on doctors who overcharge Medicare for their services. Doctors will have to hand over patient records to auditors to prove they carried out procedures for which they claimed a Medicare payment. The measure is part of…