Leela Stockley reports that a data security incident at a Northern Light Health vendor may have compromised some patients’ information. The vendor, Compumedics, provides sleep disorder diagnostic services for health system patients seen at Northern Light Eastern Maine Medical Center, Northern Light AR Gould, and Northern Light Sebasticook Valley Hospital. No report has appeared yet…
Category: Health Data
Privacy commissioner reviewing reported Ontario Health atHome data breach
CBC reports: Both Ontario’s privacy commissioner and Ontario Health are investigating a reported data breach affecting Ontario Health atHome, the province’s home-care coordination service. The incident may have exposed personal health information for at least 200,000 home-care patients, the Ontario Liberals alleged in a news release Friday morning. The breach occurred on or around March 17 of this year but…
CMS warns Medicare providers of fraud scheme
Naomi Diaz reports: The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services is warning healthcare providers and suppliers about a new fraud scheme involving fake faxed requests for medical records. According to a June 26 alert posted on CMS’ website, scammers are impersonating CMS and sending phishing faxes that falsely claim to be part of a Medicare audit. The…
Patients Allege Home Delivery Pharmacy Failed to Timely Notify Them of Data Breach
Jim Ruble writes: In January 2021, a nationwide mail-order pharmacy located in Massachusetts experienced a data breach. The pharmacy discovered the breach in May 2021 and investigated to determine its scope. Personally identifiable information (PII), including names and Social Security numbers for more than 75,000 customers, was breached. In February 2022, 9 months after the…
Patient death at London hospital linked to cyber attack on NHS
Rebecca Whittaker reports: The death of a patient has been linked to a cyber-attack on the NHS last year. Cyber criminals attacked two major NHS trusts causing more than 1,000 cancer treatment delays, 2,000 outpatient appointments to be cancelled and more than 1,000 operations postponed. King’s College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust said on Wednesday; a patient died during the cyber…
From $5,000 to $800,000: Days Apart, OCR Security Settlements Show Puzzling Math
More great reporting and analysis by Therese Defino of the Health Care Compliance Association (HCCA): A single incident that may have started as a personal vendetta or an extortion threat seven years ago has cost a Florida health care system $800,000, and comes on the heels of an unrelated breach suffered by a different hospital…