Nick Budnick reports: A Northwest Portland psychiatrist is putting out public notice that personal information of 480 current and former patients on a laptop was stolen from his office. A burglar broke into Dr. David Turner’s office last October, stealing the laptop and other items. Turner is now seeking current and former patients to inform…
Category: Health Data
A horrific privacy breach averted, but why did Anonymous remain silent? (UPDATED)
I couldn’t fall asleep last night. It’s not often that a data breach worries me, but what I read online had concerned me. According to a hacker calling himself @PabloEscobarSec, he had hacked the British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS), and intended to leak the names of all of the women who had used the service….
Ore. nurse aide posted Facebook photos of patients
Jail time for a privacy of invasion is not that common, so I thought I’d post this one from Oregon: An Oregon nursing assistant spent eight days in jail after a jury found her guilty of taking disturbing photos of elderly or disabled patients and posting them to her Facebook wall. A jury convicted Nai…
Kern Medical Center notifies 1,500 patients after records stolen from physician's car
Christine Dinh reports: Kern Medical Center is sending out letters to 1,500 patients notifying them their medical records have been stolen. KMC says the theft happened February 25. A hospital resident physician conducting research printed out 1,500 records of patients who previously visited the clinic for valley fever. The resident took home the records in…
Blue Cross error lists 1,000 customers' e-mail addresses
Richard Craver reports on what I would consider a minor breach: A communication error by a Blue Cross Blue Cross of N.C. employee Wednesday exposed the email addresses of about 1,000 customers to everyone who received the email. The email was sent to inform the customers of changes in their billing cycle. Customers were required…
New York Court Finds Clinic Not Liable for Employee's Disclosure of PHI
I can picture a lot of lawyers breathing a sigh of relief over this one. Robyn Sterling writes: A federal district court dismissed an action against an employer alleging vicarious liability for an employee’s dissemination of a patient’s protected health information (PHI) related to treatment for a sexually transmitted disease (STD). Specifically, the court found…