The sensitive health information maintained by health care providers and health plans has become an increasingly attractive target for cyberattacks. The need for health care organizations to up their game on health data security has never been greater. To help health care organizations covered by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) to bolster…
Category: Health Data
Patient monitors altered, drug dispensary popped in colossal hospital hack
Scary stuff. Darren Pauli reports: Security researchers have exploited notoriously porous hospital networks to gain access to, and tamper with, critical medical equipment in attacks they say could put lives in danger. In tests, hospital hackers from the Independent Security Evaluators research team popped patient monitors, making them display false readings which could result in…
ME: Data breach hits York Hospital employees
SeacoastOnline reports: York Hospital has been hit by cyber criminals who stole identifying information from employees, but the hospital says patient information was not targeted. A press release sent out Wednesday afternoon said there is no indication at this time that patient health information, which is stored on a system separate from staff employment information,…
Bay Area Chiropractic Center patient info allegedly stolen by doctor to open his own practice
It seems that Bay Area Chiropractic Center LLC had a breach in 2015 that they first reported to Oregon this month. The breach occurred between June 1, 2015 and August 31, 2015, and was discovered on December 10, 2015. Affected patients were notified on December 22, 2015. Why they are first reporting this to Oregon is unclear to this…
Individual Convicted of an Offence under the Health Information Act
A woman was recently convicted of knowingly accessing health information of seven people in contravention of the Health Information Act (HIA). On Feb. 5, Denise Tourneur pleaded guilty to illegitimately accessing the health information of seven individuals on 44 separate occasions at the Kaye Edmonton Clinic where she worked. The situation stemmed from a breach discovered by…
NZ health board hit with ransomware
Sophie Ryan reports: Whanganui District Health Board has been targeted by hackers who infected its computers with a “ransomware” attack. […] Whanganui District Health Board’s information and communications technology manager Barry Morris said the threat from Locky had been contained and no ransom was paid to the hackers. Read more on New Zealand Herald.