Penn Highlands Brookville (Pa.) has reported a potential data breach after discovering a third-party intruder may have gained access to a server containing protected health information.
The healthcare service used a third party vendor in Ohio to maintain the patient records of one physician, and this server may have been compromised. Potentially affected information includes patient names, addresses, birth dates, Social Security numbers, insurance information and medical information.
"Our forensics experts cannot verify with 100 percent certainty that the data security event occurred, but Penn Highlands Brookville is providing notice to affected patients so that they may take steps to protect their identity if they feel it is necessary," according to the hospital's incident report on its website.
The hospital had the third party vendor remove and destroy the data on the affected server and moved the physician's patient information to a new, secure server, according to the report.
More articles on data breaches:
UC Davis warns of potential data breach after abnormal activity detected in email account
Alere data breach class suit dismissed
Navigating a data breach: Balancing legal and communications hurdles