HIPAA Enforcement News

The Department of Veteran Affairs Office of Inspector General (VA OIG) inspected a California VA medical center recently and found security vulnerabilities linked to medical device workarounds as well as non-compliance with Veterans Health Administration […]

The healthcare industry has had a particularly bad first six months. The many reports of data breaches and the volume of healthcare records exposed every day are very concerning. The trend this 2019 is over […]

A HIPAA business associate from Madison Heights, MI, Northwood Inc., reported hacking of one of its employee’s email account and potential viewing or acquisition of sensitive patient information. Northwood Inc knew about the breach on […]

The first GDPR data breach fine has been issued by Authoriteit Persoonsgegevens, the GDPR data protection authority in the Netherlands, to Haga Hospital in the Hague. The hospital is to pay a GDPR fine of […]

Patients of Wise Health System in Decatur, TX received notification regarding the potential exposure of their protected health information (PHI) because of a phishing attack. About 35,899 patients were affected by the breach. The phishing […]

The 2019 Cost of a Data Breach Report of Ponemon Institute/IBM Security has been published. It is a detailed study of the reported data breaches in 2018. It revealed the continuous increase of data breach […]

Another healthcare provider confirmed that it was affected by the American Medical Collection Agency (AMCA) security breach. An unauthorized access of AMCA’s systems resulted to a breach of the protected health information (PHI) of its […]

Equifax has decided to resolve its federal data breach case by paying at least $575 million. The settlement could possibly go up to $700 million plus the need to make significant improvements to its security […]

Edgepark Medical Supplies (EMS) discovered on May 13, 2019 that an unauthorized person access the account of some of its customers accounts and altered their addresses causing a redirection of their orders to different delivery […]

Idaho is giving patients new rights as hospitals implement the new rules. The Idaho Department of Health and Welfare (IDHW) is implementing the rules which began July 1, 2019. IDHW stated that patient advocacy groups […]

Just a few days after expressing the intention to issue a penalty to British Airways the amount of £183 million ($230 M) for its 383-million records breach, the United Kingdom’s Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) is […]

Adirondack Health Vermont notified about 25,000 patients regarding the potential exposure of their protected health information (PHI) due to hacking. The potentially compromised information include the patients’ names, birth dates, healthcare insurance member numbers or […]

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary has declared a partial waiver of HIPAA sanctions and penalties in Louisiana because of the damage that Tropical Storm Barry likely caused when it hit […]

UK Information Commissioners Office (ICO), which is the GDPR supervisory authority, issued the biggest GDPR penalty to British Airways amounting to £183.39 million or $228 million for failure to employ security controls that led to […]

Premera Blue Cross agreed to pay $10 million to settle a multi-state data breach lawsuit that involved 30 state attorneys general. The alleged violations of state and federal laws resulted to a breach of 10.4 […]

Essentia Health is an integrated health system providing services in the states of Minnesota, North Dakota, Wisconsin and Idaho. Notifications sent to over 1,000 Essentia Health patients stated that some of their protected health information […]

Nemadji Research Corporation, doing business under the name of California Reimbursement Enterprises, released information regarding the unauthorized person who accessed the email account of an employee. There is potential exposure of the protected health information […]

GE Aestiva and Aespire Anesthesia devices were found to have an improper authentication vulnerability. These devices are typically used in hospitals all over America. The CVE-2019-10966 vulnerability can allow an attacker to remotely change the […]

A recent nCipher Security survey explored the value consumers put on their health information privacy and security. The survey had 1,300 U.S. consumers as participants and looked into their attitudes toward online personal privacy, sharing […]

Hackers exploited a two-year-old vulnerability in Microsoft Outlook targeting U.S. government networks. A warning issued by U.S. Cyber Command talked about the active exploitation of vulnerability CVE-2017-1174 and installation of remote access Trojans and other […]

A medical student is filing a lawsuit against Marshall University and Cabell Huntington Hospital because some of his protected health information (PHI) was impermissibly disclosed to a class of students. The medical student, which the […]

Alerts regarding the cybersecurity vulnerabilities discovered in several Medtronic insulin pumps were released by the United States Computer Emergency Readiness Team (US-CERT) and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The vulnerable insulin pumps connect to […]

According to a recent study, larger healthcare providers are more inclined to have fully developed, sophisticated cybersecurity defenses, whereas smaller healthcare providers struggle to implement cybersecurity best practices. KLAS and CHIME conducted the study and […]

Franciscan Health located in Mishawaka, IN found out that a former staff committed unauthorized access of the protected health information (PHI) of around 2,200 patients. In a routine privacy review, Franciscan Health learned about the […]

A former UChicago Medicine patient filed a lawsuit claiming that his medical information along with those of hundred other patients were shared with Google with no prior authorization. The lawsuit accuses UChicago Medical Center, UChicago […]

Virginia-based Dominion National, which is an insurance company, health plan manager, and administrator of dental and vision benefits, learned that a data breach affected the personal information of individuals connected to the services it provides. […]

Estes Park Health (EPH) located in Colorado was attacked by ransomware, which extensively encrypted files all across its network. EPH discovered the ransomware attack on June 2, 2019 when employees noticed and reported the computers’ […]

A patient care coordinator previously employed at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) received a one-year imprisonment term for accessing patient healthcare records and utilizing that data for malicious damages. Sue Kalina, 62, living […]

The Director of the Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) gave a warning after a surge in ‘Iranian regime actors’ cyberattacks. Christopher C. Krebs gave the warning as tensions build up […]

Cybercriminals that locate and exploit vulnerabilities to access healthcare networks and patient information are increasing their activities. The last two months were the worst and second worst months in terms of number of healthcare data […]

A ransomware attack on Tenx Systems, a company providing software for assisted living communities, impacted over 60 facilities that utilize the software program. Also known as ResiDex Software, Tenx Systems stated the attack happened on […]

A phishing attack on the Oregon Department of Human Services (ODHS) resulted to the potential compromise of the personal information of 645,000 clients. The phishing attack began on January 9, 2019, which got 9 ODHS […]

A recent ransomware attack on Shingle Springs Health and Wellness Center (SSHWC) located in Placerville, CA resulted to the potential compromise of the protected health information (PHI) of 21,513 patients. SSHWC found out on April […]

Rave Mobile Safety is hosting a webinar on June 18, 2019 that seeks to give better understanding of mental health problems, the difficulties community members encounter in relation to mental health conditions, and how to […]

An extreme ransomware attack on N.E.O Urology based in Boardman, OH impacted all of its IT system. The ransomware brought about extensive file encryption and prevented the healthcare provider from accessing its computers and patient […]

A phishing attack on Union Labor Life Insurance (ULLI), a subsidiary of Ullico Inc., resulted to the exposure of 87,000 plan members’protected health information (PHI). Data exposure happened because an employee responded to a phishing […]

An ex-employee of a healthcare provider based in Germantown, MD is alleged to have accessed the protected health information (PHI) of approximately 16,542 patients. The information was allegedly given to a third party to be […]

Ever since reports regarding the massive data breach at American Medical Collection Agency (AMCA) became known, over 12 lawsuits had been submitted by breach victims. Quest Diagnostics formally reported the breach on June 3, 2019 […]

News reports spoke of the American Medical Collection Agency (AMCA) data breach that brought about the compromise of 11.9 million Quest Diagnostics patient records. Current news cite another healthcre company affected by the AMCA breach. […]

Turlock Irrigation District in California is notifying its employees who are members of their employer-sponsored health plan regarding the exposure of some of their protected health information (PHI) online due to a business associate error. […]

The huge data breaches lately which included the breach at Quest Diagnostics affecting 11.9 million records and the breach at LabCorp affecting 7.7 million records. Now, University of Chicago Medicine announced a data breach with […]

The Vermont Supreme Court issued a ruling permitting a patient to take legal action against a hospital and nurse for privacy violation, irrespective of Vermont law and the HIPAA law that do not allow private […]

Microsoft issued another warning regarding the BlueKeep vulnerability in Remote Desktop Services (CVE-2019-0708) after publishing online proof-of-concept exploits for the vulnerability. Microsoft issued fixes for the vulnerability on May 14, 2019. Patches were also made […]

In March 2015, health insurer Premera Blue Cross in Seattle reported a major data breach that affected close to 10.6 million plan members. The breach happened in 2014 and a wide range of information was […]

People Inc. is a non-profit health and human services firm located in Western New York providing services to elderly people and people with developmental disabilities. A phishing attack on the organization affected roughly 1,000 persons. […]

Medical Oncology Hematology Consultants (MOHC), a Newark,DE based cancer treatment center, suffered an email security breach that lead to the compromise of the protected health information (PHI) of some patients. MOHC published a substitute breach […]

Many view the HHS’ Office for Civil Rights’ enforcement of HIPAA compliance as excessively punitive. Compliance investigations after receiving complaints or data breaches reports usually result to the discovery of HIPAA Rules violations and sizable […]

A recent announcement requires Medical Informatics Engineering (MIE) to pay a financial penalty amounting to $900,000 to resolve a multi-state lawsuit over the HIPAA violations linked to a breach of 3.9 million records in 2015. […]

Microsoft released a patch on May 14, 2019 for fixing a ‘wormable’ vulnerability found in Windows, which is the same as the vulnerability exploited by attackers in the WannaCry ransomware attacks in May 2017. The […]

Ever since the implementation of the requirements of the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act of 2009 in the 2013 Omnibus Final Rule by the Department of Health and Human Services, […]

Medical Informatics Engineering, Inc (MIE) settled with the HHS’ Office for Civil Rights its HIPAA violation case by paying $100,000. MIE provides electronic medical record software and services in Indiana. Its case of serious data […]

Thousands of health records were found left behind in a public dumpster located in Texas. The boxes comprise of patient and employee records from Today’s Vision and include documents that contain highly sensitive data. Today’s […]

Cancer Treatment Centers of America (CTCA) suffered another breach involving the e-mail account of one personnel working at its Southeastern Regional Medical Center. The breach on March 10, 2019 happened after a phishing attack. The […]

The American Academy of Neurology (AAN) spoke about their concerns on the interoperability plans of the HHS’ Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT (ONC) and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). […]

April was really bad for healthcare data breaches. The number of reported data breaches this month is higher than any other month since October 2009 when the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for […]

A recent Forescout study highlighted the poor condition of healthcare cybersecurity. The study showed the over reliance of the healthcare industry on legacy software, the extensive use of vulnerable protocols, and the lack of security […]

American Baptist Homes of the Midwest (ABHM), which provides assisted living and assisted care facilities throughout the U.S Midwest, announced a ransomware attack on its systems causing a security breach. The attack was launched around […]

The Southeastern Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence (SCADD) located in Lebanon, CT had a ransomware attack that caused considerable file encryption. SCADD experienced network problems that led to the discovery of the ransomware attack […]

A sexual assault victim filed a lawsuit against Atchison Hospital in Kansas because allegedly a hospital x-ray technician shared sensitive data to her attacker regarding her treatment at the hospital. As per the Kansas City […]

The 2019 Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report has been released. It gives a detailed summary of data breaches that public and private entities reported all over the world. The extensive report gives exhaustive insights and […]

Verity Health System’s St. Vincent Medical Center discovered the compromise of a web email account because of a phishing attack. The breach took place on March 15, 2019 where a hospital pathologist’s email account was […]

The website owner of Bodybuilding.com, a website about bodybuilding and fitness, reported a security breach that could have caused the access of client and personnel data by unauthorized persons. Under HIPAA, this kind of breach […]

After the Inmediata breach that caused the exposure of PHI, the company sent by mail notification letters to the people affected by the breach. However many people reported that they got notification letters addressed to […]

Facebook is applying some changes to Facebook Groups that talk about health conditions. This move was prompted because of the criticism on Facebook Groups that despite its being offered as private and confidential, third parties […]

A vulnerability was found in the Philips Tasy EMR system. An attacker can take advantage of the vulnerability and transmit unexpected data to the system that could execute an arbitrary code, alter data flow, impact […]

The U.S Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Inspector General (OIG) released its yearly evaluation of the HHS to ascertain compliance with the Federal Information Security Management Act of 2014 (FISMA). Ernst & […]

The DICOM image format has been available for about 30 years. It has a design ‘flaw’ that hackers could exploit to add malware in image files. If that happens, the protected health information (PHI) will […]

A notification of enforcement discretion issued by the Department of Health and Human Services about the civil monetary penalties applied whenever there are HIPAA Rules violations discovered will reduce the maximum financial penalty in three […]

The Washington legislature made a unanimous decision to pass HB 1071 / SB 5064, a new data breach notification law. The only the bill needs is the signature of Washington Governor Jay Inslee. The law […]

The King County Superior Court lately agreed to a $4.7 million settlement to pay back the people whose personal data were stolen in a breach at Washington State University in April 2017. Portable hard drives […]

Three breaches involving patients’ protected health information (PHI) due to email hacking were reported. The three hacking incidents affected a total of 8,635 patients. The first breach happened in the Center for Sight and Hearing […]

The HHS’ Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT (ONC) has published a second draft of the Trusted Exchange Framework and Common Agreement (TEFCA) and is accepting comments on the revised material. The objective […]

The highly sensitive data of patients who had received treatment at addiction rehabilitation centers were discovered to be publicly accessible online because of an unsecured database. There were around 4.91 million records in the database, […]

Gulf Coast Pain Consultants, also called Clearway Pain Solutions Institute, found out that its EMR system was accessed by an unauthorized individual. A breach investigation which started on February 20, 2019 revealed that a variety […]

993 beneficiaries of Medicaid or have obtained services from the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services (ODJFS) living in Ohio received notification that unauthorized persons potentially viewed some of their protected health information (PHI) […]

A malware was installed on the systems of Riverplace Counseling Center in Anoka, MN, which resulted to the access of the protected health information (PHI) of patients by unauthorized persons. The counseling center discovered the […]

The website of Blue Cross of Idaho was hacked resulting to the access of its member portal by an unauthorized person who viewed the protected health information (PHI) of some members. Blue Cross of Idaho […]

The consultancy company CynergisTek conducted a study recently and found that healthcare organizations aren’t in conformity to the HIPAA Privacy and Security Rules and the NIST Cybersecurity Framework (CSF) controls. CynergisTek studied the NIST CSF […]

The Minnesota Department of Human Services (DHS) received another report of a phishing attack that resulted to the compromise of an employee’s email account. This security breach transpired on or before March 26, 2018. This […]

Massachusetts Baystate Health had a phishing attack which impacted the protected health information (PHI) of 12,000 patients. A few employees had their email accounts compromised between February 7 to March 7, 2019. When Baystate Health […]

A phishing attack on Palmetto Health, which is now called Prisma Health, allowed unauthorized persons to access several email accounts. Palmetto Health employees received email messages that have a malicious hyperlink. When the employees clicked […]

Amazon announced a new service that allows healthcare professionals to de-identify medical images by automatically removing any identifying protected health information (PHI) presented in the images. Pictures taken in medical settings often contain personally identifiable […]

A group of 81 female patients of Sharp HealthCare and Sharp Grossmont Hospital have filed a lawsuit against the facility for severe breaches in patient privacy. The lawsuit alleges that the hospital secretly recorded video […]

The number of health and fitness apps and devices has exploded in recent years. These technologies offer the user assistance in achieving a healthier lifestyle by offering personalised guidance or helping the user track any […]

A patient who found her discovered that her private medical information was available on social media platforms is suing the Northwestern Medicine Regional Medical Group for PHI exposure. Earlier this month, Gina Graziano discovered that […]

UCLA Health has settled a class action lawsuit filed by victims of a 2014 data breach for $7.5 million. The UCLA Health breach was one of the largest data breaches in history. Hackers accessed the […]

Beazley Breach Response Services have released a new report indicating that 71% of ransomware attacks target small and medium businesses (SMBs). Ransomware is malware variant which denies the user access to their device, or individual […]

Security researchers have identified two vulnerabilities in the Conexus telemetry protocol used by Medtronic MyCarelink monitors, CareLink monitors, CareLink 2090 programmers, and 17 implanted cardiac devices. One vulnerability is rated as ‘critical’, and the other […]

The University of Washington is alerting nearly a million patients of a data breach that resulted in unauthorised individuals being able to access their protected health information (PHI) through search engines online. The error was […]

Senator Gary Farmer (D-FL) and Representative Bobby DuBose (D-FL) have proposed new bills concerning consumers’ data privacy rights over their biometric data. The Florida Biometric Information Privacy Act aims to “establish requirements and restrictions on […]

Sharecare Health Data Services has reported that an unauthorised individual gained access to sensitive information stored in their systems. Sharecare Health Data Services (SHDS), based in San Diego, provides secure electronic exchange and medical records […]

The 2019 edition of the Verizon Mobile Security Index has been released, showing the significant risk that mobile device breaches pose to the healthcare industry. The report surveyed eight industry sectors to assess the data […]

Columbia Surgical Specialists have announced a ransomware attack on their facility has potentially compromised the PHI of up to 400,000 patients. Columbia Surgical Specialists (CSS), based in Spokane, Washington, discovered the attack on January 9, […]

Senator Catherine Cortex Masto (D-NV) has introduced a new bill which aims to tackle concerns consumers face about the collection and use of their data. Senator Catherine Cortex Masto’s “Data Privacy Act” calls for organisations […]

Kentucky Counselling Center has announced that a data breach has resulted in the exposure of 16,440 patient data files.  On January 4, 2019, a former employee notified Kentucky Counselling Center (KCC) that they had received […]

Rutland Medical Center has announced it has experienced a data breach after an unauthorised individual gained access to the email accounts of several employees. An employee of Rutland Medical Center noticed the breach after realising […]

UConn Health has announced that a recent phishing attack has compromised approximately 326,000 patient files.  UConn Health is the branch of the University of Connecticut that oversees clinical care, advanced biomedical research, and academic education […]

Drupal has released an update which corrects a critical vulnerability in the Drupal CMS.  Drupal is a free and open-source content management framework and provides the back-end framework for approximately 2.3% of websites worldwide.  The […]

Deep Instinct has announced that it has identified a new phishing campaign is spreading Separ malware.   Researchers at Deep Instinct identified the last campaign in January 2019. The threat actors behind this version of […]

The National Cybersecurity Center of Excellence (NCCoE) has released a guide to mobile device security. The guide entitled NIST Special Publication 1800-4 Mobile Device Security: Cloud & Hybrid Builds provides practical advice for organisations looking to […]