Technology

Australia is in the midst of a major data breach crisis after the health records of millions of Aussies were released on the dark web by hackers demanding undisclosed ransom. According to an article published online by Gizmodo, Australian insurance provider Medibank negotiated with the unknown hackers before ultimately deciding not to pay—at which point the cybercriminals put private medical information online. The group, which cybersecurity experts are calling BlogXX, appears to be running a …

A ransomware attack threw CommonSpirit Health hospitals into disarray recently, leaving electronic health record systems useless and wreaking havoc on understaffed emergency rooms, according to a report from Becker’s Health IT. The company said it was working to determine the depth and effect of the attack. There was no word on who was responsible for the attack or what the end objective may be. The best time to assess the level of risk with any …

OakBend Medical Center in Richmond, TX is scrambling to deal with a ransomware attack by a group calling itself Daixin Team. As reported by the online tech news publication The Register, the attack initially shut down the hospital’s communication and IT systems and “stole” more than 1 million patient records. It’s unclear what the group’s demands or intentions are, though they’ve threatened to release a “full leak” of the data. The threat of cyber crime …

A Chicago urgent care operator is the latest healthcare facility to be the target of a data breach with the potential to expose the healthcare records and other sensitive information of more than a hundred thousand patients. It’s believed that the breach, which is thought to have occurred over several days in May, was the result of hackers intentionally trying to access the system. While the potential consequences of that to patients are obvious, don’t …

A patient Googles “urgent care near me” and sees your location among the top three results. Even better, they see that your center is on their way home and open until 8. And yet, when they get to your place at 7:25 they find the posted hours say you closed at 7. Here’s the problem in this hypothetical—but very real life—scenario: Even if your website is up to date web crawlers can still “find” and …

Walgreens inadvertently left the data of millions of its customers unprotected thanks to an apparent oversight in the creation of an app used for COVID-19 test registrations. As reported by Recode, information—including names, contact information, and even the results of COVID-19 tests—on anyone who was tested at a Walgreens location within the last year could have been exposed on the open web. While this breach was not the work of hackers or other cybercriminals, the …

It’s debatable whether it’s safer to keep all your sensitive data in one large system (thereby putting it all at risk in the event of a single breach) vs maintaining a cluster of smaller systems (in which case the risk is multiplied, but the loss of data might not be so great). The answer could depend on the size and scope of your operation, so in many cases it makes sense to engage a cybersecurity …

When Scripps Health was hit by a cyberattack a few weeks ago, it sent workers scrambling to ascertain the security of sensitive patient health information, company files, and other protected or proprietary data. It’s also likely that the event shook the company’s sense of its own security, probably leaving some with a PTSD-like sense of dread. Needless to say, it also disrupted care at the hospitals and urgent care centers affected. While Scripps has been …

As 2020 was winding down, we all became aware of a widespread and highly alarming hack that has since been attributed to operators in Russia. While it does not appear to have been targeted at healthcare organizations, the fact that it happened at all should be a reminder of the potential risks you face with proprietary information, access to financial accounts, and HIPAA-protected patient information. Then there’s the whole issue of online censorship that has …