On October 10th, Joyce Musante, Privacy Office Lead for CIGNA, notified the Maryland Attorney General’s Office that a disk sent to a governmental agency by a certified courier on June 20th had been lost. The unnamed courier notified CIGNA on September 9th that the package had been damaged and the contents were missing. Despite an…
Oops – Highmark sends enrollee data to wrong customer
According to a report provided to the Maryland Attorney General’s Office, an employee mistakenly transmitted an encrypted Excel file with enrollment data for Reed Smith to the another group customer. The file containing names, addresses, dates of birth, identification numbers (which are the individuals’ Social Security numbers), type of insurance contract, effective date, and group…
Patient breaches and P2P networks
Over on The Breach Blog, Evan Francen has written up some of the P2P breaches uncovered by Red Team Protection. It makes for fascinating reading, and a cautionary tale. If you have any patient or confidential information on your computer, installing or running file-sharing programs may result in you sharing much more than you intended…
Medical ID Theft
Jennifer Nelson reports: When Brandon Sharp, 37, of Spring, Tex., applied for his first home loan, his lender called with bad news: The $20,000 in unpaid hospital bills on his credit report had damaged his chances for a mortgage. But Sharp hadn’t had any health problems. He was a victim of medical ID theft. Someone…
UK: Who is looking at your medical records?
Brian Wheeler reports: The idea of people you have never met before leafing through your medical records would make most people a little uneasy. Even if the people in question are highly qualified health professionals. Read more in the BBC
Medical data released by accident on 3,700 Blue Cross Blue Shield members
Dan Shortridge reports: A printing error disclosed the private medical information of about 3,700 Blue Cross Blue Shield members in Delaware to other insurance company subscribers. People who were affected by the problem should have received letters today notifying them of the accidental disclosure. […] The problem centers around explanation of benefits forms that were…