U.S. Postal Service: Hack compromised health data of 485K individuals

The health information of about 485,000 U.S. Postal Service (USPS) employees, former employees and retirees was breached when intruders broke into the service’s computer networks last fall.  

Although it has been reported that the September 2014 intrusion compromised the Social Security numbers of about 800,000 USPS employees, details are just emerging on the breach of medical information, reports Nextgov.

In the incident, hackers accessed injury compensation claims, which included medical information, according to a Dec. 10 letter from USPS Chief Human Resources Officer Jeffrey Williamson. The medical data include injury diagnoses and procedure codes, the physical location of the bodily harm and billing codes for medical, surgical and diagnostic services, according to the letter, Nextgov reported.  

USPS is not required to report breaches under HIPAA; however under federal privacy law employees can sue as a class for data breaches.