Oliver Moody reports: Latvia has come under the most intense wave of cyberattacks in its history, including a 12-hour onslaught on its public broadcasting centre, according to a senior Nato official. The Baltic state appears to have been targeted by pro-Kremlin hackers because of a series of assertive steps such as bringing back conscription and drawing…
UK: Hackers have access to bank details, signatures, addresses and national insurance numbers, Gloucester councillor reveals
Carmelo Garcia reports: People in Gloucester have had their signatures, addresses, national insurance numbers, bank details and driving licences accessed by hackers, a councillor has revealed. Many local people’s lives were thrown into disarray in December when council services were disrupted by a major cyber attack. House sales, benefit payments and planning applications were all delayed after hackers compromised…
Ca: How the court bolstered an insurer’s exclusion for privacy breach
David Gambrill reports: Acting recklessly in breaching the confidential medical files of patients effectively falls within a hospital insurer’s commercial policy exclusion for committing an ‘intentional act,’ Ontario’s top court has ruled. The Ontario Court of Appeal found a hospital insurer, the Healthcare Insurance Reciprocal of Canada, does not have a duty to defend a…
NY: Mattituck School District targeted in ransomware attack Wednesday
Melissa Azofeifa and Joe Werkmeister report: The Mattituck-Cutchogue School District was the latest Long Island district to be the target of a ransomware attack. Superintendent Shawn Petretti issued a statement Friday saying an investigation into the attack is in its early stages. From the district’s statement: “On Wednesday, July 6, our school district became the…
WY: Former Employee Inappropriately Accessed Cheyenne Regional Medical Center Patient Health Records
Phoenixville Hospital was just one of two reports this week involving employees behaving badly by accessing patient files without a legitimate purpose. On July 6, Cheyenne Regional Medical Center in Wyoming revealed that a former employee had inappropriately accessed several patients’ personal health records between August 31, 2020, and May 26, 2022. In this case,…
PA: Phoenixville Hospital notifying patients after discovering improper EMR access by employee
Despite employers’ best efforts, some employees will just continue to try to snoop in patient files. This time, a covered entity discovered the wrongdoing via their own internal monitoring. Phoenixville Hospital, operated by Tower Health, reports that a recent review detected that an employee had accessed a patient’s electronic medical records (EMR) without any apparent…