A former staff member of Tampa General Hospital has been convicted of wrongful disclosure of individually identifiable health information and wire fraud. Shanakia Benton was accused of illegally obtaining the protected health information of patients during the time...

Following the 2.7 million HIPAA breach settlement with Oregon Health & Science University is news of yet another multi-million-dollar settlement with another university. The Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights revealed two days ago...

Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU) has agreed to settle a case with the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights which arose from two data breaches suffered in 2013. A penalty of $2.7 million will be paid by OHSU to settle alleged...

Cyberattacks on healthcare groups are now commonplace and, as long as it is profitable for hackers to attack healthcare organizations, the cyberattacks will continue. Given the number of healthcare data violations now being reported, it is evident that the healthcare...

Catholic Health Care Services of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia (CHCS) has agreed to settle alleged HIPAA violations with the OCR and has agreed to put in place a Corrective Action Plan (CAP). CHCS will also pay a financial fine of $650,000. CHCS is the sole...

Recently an officer from the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department (IMPD) found a number of medical records in a recycling dumpster, accessible to the public, in Broad Ripple Park, Indianapolis. A quantity of confidential documents were located in file folders...

Recently, the head of the House Select Investigative Panel tasked with reviewing the trade of baby body parts by abortion clinics corresponded with the director of the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights asking an investigation into...

In a recent ruling the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights (OCR) found that a former town administrator of Townsend, MA., violated the HIPAA Privacy Rule in June last year. This occurred when he posted an “information packet” online...

The Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights (OCR) has fined New York Presbyterian Hospital (NYP) $2.2 million for permitting patients to be filmed for a TV show without receiving prior permission from the patients. In 2011, an ABC crew was...

The Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights (OCR) has revealed a compensation settlement has been agreed with Raleigh Orthopaedic Clinic, P.A., of North Carolina over alleged breaches of HIPAA Rules. Raleigh Orthopaedic has agreed to pay OCR...

A legal case has been initiated in Federal Court in San Jose, California by cancer patients who claim they have had their privacy violated after visiting the websites of cancer institutes. The plaintiffs allege that the websites of some cancer institutes contain...

Data violation notification laws in Tennessee have been reviewed to better protect state residents. The new law requires organizations to issue breach notifications to state residents more quickly, while the range of information covered has been widened. When the new...

Feinstein Institute for Medical Research has settled potential HIPAA violations for $3.9 million with the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights. This is the second largest settlement penalty agreed with OCR, just below the $4.8 million...

The Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights has revealed it has reached a settlement with North Memorial Health Care of Minnesota over what is claimed were HIPAA violations  arising from a 2011 data breach. North Memorial has agreed to pay...

The Office for Civil Rights encourages suggestions from HIPAA-covered bodies about aspects of HIPAA that are unclear or need further clarification. Some of the inquiries submitted via the OCR website indicate some covered bodies are struggling to comprehend the Health...

A report of an investigation into South Carolina’s Medicaid agency by The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Inspector General has been published The investigation was carried out  in 2013 following the 2012 hacking of the Revenue Department and a...

OCR has revealed it has come at a settlement with a Los Angeles-based provider of physical therapy services after the discovery of HIPAA Privacy Rule breaches in 2012. Complete P.T., Pool & Land Physical Therapy, Inc., (CPT) has said they will pay a fine of...

OCR has ordered a HIPAA-covered entity to pay civil monetary penalties for HIPAA breaches. Lincare Inc. must to pay $239,800 for violations of the HIPAA Privacy Rule which were found during the investigation of a complaint about a breach of 278 patient records. The...

A recent survey carried out by Legal Workspace suggests that many are not. In fact, most health attorneys are not in adherence with HIPAA Rules and have failed to implement the appropriate technical, administrative, and physical measures to keep PHI/PII secure. Legal...

TigertText has revealed the launch of two new communication solutions for healthcare providers. The two new devices have clear potential, and could convince many healthcare providers to start replacing pagers and faxes. The new products, named TigerPage &...

The healthcare industry trails well behind every other industry sector when it comes to implementing new technology. It is an acknowledged fact that the sector appears to dear change, even when those alterations stand to significantly improve the lot of patients. With...

Microsoft will be stopping support and security updates for Internet Explorer 8, 9 and 10 as of Wednesday January 12, 2016. All users of Internet Explorer must switch to Internet Explorer 11, or make the switch over to Microsoft Edge, in order to continue receiving...

Organizations operating in Oregon must now adhere with a new data breach law that came into effect on January 1, 2016. If a data breach that exposes the personal information of more than 250 state residents is experienced, a breach notice must be filed to the Oregon...

The Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights has started 2016 with the launch of a brand new website interface, and has now followed up on previous assurance by issuing new guidance on HIPAA. This is the first in what is expected to be a...

The FTC has also ordered Henry Schein Practice Solutions, Inc., to pay a fine of $250,000, and the company must also comply with a 20-year consent order after a recent ruling said the company had “falsely advertised the level of encryption it provided to protect...

The Department of Health and Human Services has revealed a final rule permitting certain covered bodies to disclose specific elements of Protected Health Information (PHI) to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS), altering the HIPAA Privacy...

The Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights website has completed a redesigned recently, upgrading with new features, a responsive design and a more user-friendly feel. The redesign was part of the Reimagined HHS.gov project. The aim was to...

The Office for Civil Rights recently release its first financial penalty to an organization that experienced a data violation after its staff responded to a phishing campaign. The case lead to The University of Washington Medicine agreeing to a $750,000 fine to settle...

New cybersecurity measures specifically for the healthcare industry have been added to the Omnibus bill signed into law by Congress late last week. The aim of their inclusion is to help healthcare organizations tackle the growing danger of cyberattacks, and supply...

TigerText, the largest supplier of secure text messaging solutions, has revealed the its latest initiative, TigerText Anywhere: A HIPAA compliant secure texting app for desktop computing. TigerText’s HIPAA compliant text message platform has already been a great...