Ken Foxe reports: The HSE has suffered almost 1,400 separate data breaches over the past two years involving photographing of patients, infection status being disclosed to other family members, and the discovery of confidential medical files in public places. The number of breaches showed a sharp rise between 2018, when 556 incidents were recorded, and…
Category: Health Data
Ashley County Medical Center investigates former employee accused of violating federal privacy laws
Gabrielle Phifer reports: Ashley County Medical Center is investigating a former employee they claim inappropriately viewed medical records of 772 patients. According to a release, ACMC’s policy and procedures revealed that a former employee, who has been identified as a nurse, accessed some patient information for purposes unrelated to care and treatment. Based on investigations…
Three more medical practices hit by ransomware
Atlanta does not seem to be a safe place for cybersecurity of orthopedic patients’ data. In 2016, orthopedic clinics in Atlanta got clobbered by two big breaches involving thedarkoverlord. The first was a hack and extortion demand on Athens Orthopedic Clinic, an organization that had more than a dozen locations but somehow didn’t have enough…
OH: Premier Health Partners Discloses Breach, but No Notifications to Patients Yet
Well, they know something happened, but they haven’t completed their identification of whom they need to notify yet, it seems. From a notice on Premier Health Partners‘ web site: Premier Health Partners (“Premier Health”) is providing notice of an incident that may impact the privacy of personal information for certain patients and clients of the…
Argentina exposes COVID-19 health data in error
Tim Sandle reports: Argentina’s health officials have apparently exposed personal medical data relating to some 115,000 COVID-19 quarantine exemption applicants, in what represents a major health sector data breach. […] An Elasticsearch database containing personal information of more than 115,000 Argentinians who applied for COVID-19 circulation permits was exposed on the web without a password…
Due to HHS intervention, an FTP leak in 2018 is finally reported to patients
It looks like HHS followed up on a leak first reported by DataBreaches.net in May, 2018. At the time, this site noted that two MedEvolve clients had exposed data. One of them was Beverly Held, M.D. A researcher had found .dat files exposed without any login required and estimated that there were approximately 12,000 SSNs…