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Health Net data loss worse than thought

NEWS IN BRIEF — Posted Aug. 29, 2011

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California-based health plan Health Net is expanding its offer of free credit to more people after discovering that a data security breach it reported in March was worse than originally thought.

The company's information technology contractor, IBM, lost servers from Health Net's Rancho Cordova, Calif., offices. Connecticut and California regulators already were investigating the incident because it appeared to have been months between when it was discovered and when it was disclosed.

The California Dept. of Managed Health Care said in March that 1.9 million current and former subscribers were affected by the breach.

Health Net spokesman Brad Kieffer said in a statement Aug. 15 that through its own investigation, the company recently discovered that some of the member information included Social Security numbers, and that some people whose information was compromised were never notified. The company has extended the deadline for affected members to sign up for two years of free credit monitoring.

He did not say how many additional people are believed to be affected.

"To date, Health Net has no indication that any of the information on the unaccounted-for server drives has been used to commit identify theft, and we continue monitoring the situation closely," Kieffer said.

Note: This item originally appeared at http://www.ama-assn.org/amednews/2011/08/29/bibf0829.htm.

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