Backup hard drives stolen from state medical association
Two archives backup hard drives were stolen from the Indiana State Medical Association (ISMA) on Feb. 13.
The equipment stored the ISMA group health and life insurance databases, which contained information on 39,090 insured individuals. This was a random criminal act that occurred while an ISMA employee was transporting the hard drives to an offsite storage location as part of the association’s disaster recovery plan, according to a release. The theft was reported to the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department (IMPD), which is actively investigating.
The information on the stolen hard drives, which cannot be retrieved without special equipment and technical expertise, included identifying information such as names, addresses, dates of birth, email addresses, health plan numbers, Social Security numbers and personal medical history information.
ISMA sent notification letters to the individuals affected, which are current and former insureds of the ISMA insurance plans.
ISMA is offering one year of credit-monitoring and repair services to all persons affected at no cost to them.
ISMA has already engaged outside experts who are reviewing our internal processes to prevent future incidents.
Editor
Editor Beth earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism and master’s in health communication. She has worked in hospital, academic and publishing settings over the past 20 years. Beth joined TriMed in 2005, as editor of CMIO and Clinical Innovation + Technology. When not covering all things related to health IT, she spends time with her husband and three children.