BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee, an administrative partner with TRH Health Plan, accessed the names and addresses of members of TRH Health Plan and inappropriately used the information to create marketing materials, according to a Tennessean report.
TRH has notified approximately 80,000 members of the incident.
"They have the right to have [the information], but didn't have the right to use for marketing," said Ryan Brown, general counsel at TRH, in the report.
BCBS of Tennessee allegedly shared the information internally with the marketing department and also sent the information to a third-party vendor who prepared the mailings, according to the report.
"We made a mistake and included TRH members in a BlueCross Medicare Advantage mail marketing campaign," said a BCBS spokeswoman in the report.
The spokeswoman also indicated BCBS of Tennessee worked with the printer to stop some of the mailings, and the vendors have destroyed the data.
More articles on data breaches:
St. Peter's Health Partners notifying patients of data breach following cell phone theft
This hospital device could be the source of the next data breach
Medical device company reports data breach due to stolen laptop