Kathleen Struck reports: Hacking into patient medical records can be as easy as tapping into a hospital’s unsecured wireless network from a laptop in the parking lot. Government auditors proved it “by sitting in hospital parking lots with simple laptop computers” and obtaining “patient information from unsecured hospital wireless networks,” according to Julie K. Taitsman,…
Category: Health Data
AU: Soldiers' medical records found on road
David Murray reports: Confidential medical records detailing names, addresses and injuries of soldiers have been found scattered on a busy Brisbane street. The sensitive documents were blowing along Leichhardt St at Spring Hill near the base of an orthopaedic specialist treating the soldiers. Read more on The Australian. The orthopedist was not named. Hopefully there…
Illegal Marketer of Medicare Information Admits Role in Detroit-area Home Health Care Fraud Scheme
A health care worker who sold Medicare beneficiary information to Detroit-area home health agency operators as part of a $24.7 million home health care fraud conspiracy pleaded guilty this week for his role in the scheme, which sought to profit by billing for home healthcare services that were medically unnecessary and not provided. Clarence Cooper,…
Hello, you appear to have been hacked. Hello? Anyone there?
I’ve occasionally blogged about how frustrating it can be to try to notify an organization that they’ve apparently been hacked or had a breach. When that organization is a hospital and I can’t reach anyone, it’s even more frustrating. This week, it happened again. I ranted in Twitter a bit, and Jake Kouns suggested I…
EXCLUSIVE: Johns Hopkins offering patients affected by privacy breach free counseling services
As I mentioned in previous posts, Johns Hopkins’ first breach statement about OB/GYN patients who may have been secretly photographed or videotaped by a physician included a reference to “counseling” for patients. Since this was the first time I’ve ever seen a reference to “counseling” in a breach notification statement and it struck me as…
Police Work To Identify Patients Whose Privacy May Have Been Violated By Gynecologist
Fears over a privacy breach involving a now-deceased doctor at Johns Hopkins are growing as word spreads about the breach. As reported by CBS, a number of Dr. Nikita Levy’s patients are worried that they may have been videotaped or recorded by him during gynecological or obstetrical visits and that the recordings may have been…