Privacy law scholar Daniel Solove writes: The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit just issued a blistering attack on HIPAA enforcement by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). In University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer v. Department of Health and Human Services (No. 19-60226, Jan. 14, 2001), the 5th Circuit struck down a fine…
Category: U.S.
Hackers try to contaminate Florida town’s water supply through computer breach
This is the stuff nightmares are made of. Chris Bing reports: Hackers broke into the computer system of a facility that treats water for about 15,000 people near Tampa, Florida and sought to add a dangerous level of additive to the water supply, the Pinellas County Sheriff said on Monday. The attempt on Friday was…
Contractor for USAO Southern District of Iowa Provided Sensitive, Non-Public Info on Criminal Investigations to a Friend; Informants Wound Up “Outed” Online
An Iowa woman pleaded guilty today for unlawfully using a former Department of Justice contractor’s government computer to access government records and to obtain sensitive, non-public law enforcement information, announced Acting Assistant Attorney General Nicholas L. McQuaid of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division. According to admissions made in connection with her guilty plea, Rachel Manna,…
USDA Denies Data Breach at Payroll Facility
Mariam Baksh reports: The U.S. Department of Agriculture has found “no evidence” of a data breach at a payroll processing center but is investigating, a spokesperson said in response to news reports to the contrary. Reuters first reported on Tuesday that the department’s National Finance Center, which runs a payroll system serving over 600,000 federal employees…
Court grants injunction, restraining order against NEW Co-op
Elijah Decius reports: A federal District Court judge has granted a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction requested by Landus Cooperative in its lawsuit against NEW Cooperative of Fort Dodge. The lawsuit, filed two weeks ago by the Ames-based co-op, accuses disgruntled former Landus employees Jeff Headley and Brian Berns of conspiring and stealing protected…
CEO who lied to thousands of patients by telling them they had less than six months to live in order to enroll them in hospice sentenced to prison
There are bad breaches, and then there are the ones where words like “despicable,” “evil,” “immoral,” “disgusting,” and “reprehensible” just seem too weak to express how decent people might feel. This case out of Texas is one of those. Here is DOJ’s press release issued today: The CEO of a Texas-based group of hospice and…