181000 records compromised in Utah Security Breach
"We understand clients are worried about who may have accessed their personal information, and that many of them feel violated by having their information compromised," said Michael Hales, deputy director of the Health Department. "But we also hope they understand we are doing everything we can to protect them from further harm."
Utah health officials said that hackers who broke into state computers last weekend stole far more medical records than originally thought, and the data likely includes Social Security numbers of children who have received public assistance.
The Utah Department of Health has been hacked. 181,604 Medicaid/CHIP recipients have had their personal information stolen. 25,096 have had their Social Security numbers (SSNs) compromised.
What is particularly threatening about this attack is the fact that the stolen records included personal information including client names, addresses, birth dates, SSNs, physician's names, national provider identifiers, addresses, tax identification numbers, and procedure codes designed for billing purposes.
"We understand clients are worried about who may have accessed their personal information, and that many of them feel violated by having their information compromised," said Michael Hales, deputy director of the Health Department. "But we also hope they understand we are doing everything we can to protect them from further harm."
DTS has implemented new procedures to ensure that this type of breach will never happen again. Additional steps are being implemented to improve security controls related to the implementation of computer hardware and software, as well as increased network monitoring and intrusion detection capabilities.
