Greg Bluestein of Associated Press reports that Andrew Speaker’s attorneys were back in court trying to revive his lawsuit against the CDC for outing him in 2007. Speaker became famous or infamous as the man who was supposedly told he had a very virulent (and contagious) form of tuberculosis but then took a commercial air…
Category: Health Data
Pittsburgh settles lawsuit over exposing confidential medical info
Joe Smydo of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports that one of two federal lawsuits recently settled by the Pittsburgh City Council involved a breach of confidential medical information both in a public meeting and online. Although this is a settlement and not a court or jury decision, what’s interesting is that the basis for claim was…
FI: Patients' sensitive information is still falling into wrong hands
More on the Data Protection findings in Finland that I’ve mentioned in a few previous posts. Marjo Valtavaara describes some of the breaches: The Hospital District of Helsinki and Uusimaa was under a special surveillance by the Data Protection Ombudsman for a year, after it had been revealed that unauthorised people had gained access to…
CA: ID thief hits state coffers for $200,000
Julie Johnson reports: A mobile blood-testing company is believed to be the source of 500,000 California identities used to create fake drivers licenses and checks, investigators said. A Castro Valley man is at the center of what detectives called a “huge” scheme in which stolen identities were used to create fraudulent unemployment and in-home health…
Clarity Needed in Breach Notification Rule
Howard Anderson writes: My fingers are crossed that the final version of the federal breach notification rule greatly clarifies when a breach has to be reported to the individuals affected as well as federal authorities. I hope the final version states in the simplest possible terms that the federal law supersedes state laws, unless the…
KPMG employee loses unencrypted flash drive with patient info on 3,630
An accounting firm used by the Saint Barnabas Health Care System and its affiliated hospitals in New Jersey has reportedly lost an unencrypted flash drive that may have contained some patients’ names as well as information about their health care. In a notice on their web site, the hospital states that the flash drive lost…