A massive data breach at UnitedHealth Group has exposed the health and wellbeing information of more than 100 million individuals, marking the first time the company has publicly quantified the scale of the incident.
Ransomware attackers struck Change Healthcare for a second time in February, but it wasn’t until yesterday that the company publicly disclosed the “unprecedented scale” of the cyberattack.
UnitedHealth hack
The revelations have been a slow-burning enigma.
UnitedHealth has officially disclosed that more than 100 million individuals had their personal information and sensitive healthcare data compromised in the recent Change Healthcare ransomware attack, making it the largest healthcare data breach to date.
During May’s Congressional hearing, UnitedHealth CEO Andrew Witty cautioned that nearly one-third of Americans’ health data may have been exposed in the breach.
One month after the initial attack, Change Healthcare issued a notification revealing that the February ransomware incident had exposed a substantial quantity of sensitive information affecting a significant portion of Americans.
Right now, the U.S. The Division of Well being and Human Services Office for Civil Rights’ data breach portal has been updated to reveal that a staggering 100 million individuals have been impacted, marking the first time UnitedHealth, the parent company of Change Healthcare, has officially quantified the scope of the breach.
The sensitivity of the compromised data was equivalent to its size in terms of significance.
- Medical insurance data comprises primary, secondary, or distinct health plans/insurance policies from various providers, including insurance carrier information, unique member/group identification numbers, as well as Medicaid-Medicare-government payer identifiers.
- Well-being data, akin to medical file numbers and supplier information,
- Billing, claims, and fee data include declaration numbers, account numbers, billing codes, fee schedules, monetary, and banking information, as well as funds received and amounts due.
- Private data akin to credit card information must never be stored or transmitted via unsecured methods.
The level of accurate understanding discovered may vary from individual to individual.
The incident unfolded with alarming ease when an attacker exploited the company’s vulnerable Citrix remote access system, which had not been secured with two-factor authentication, allowing them to gain unauthorized access using pilfered login credentials.
A colossal 6 terabytes of data were accessed before the corporation’s computer systems were encrypted, sparking pandemonium among both medical professionals and patients. The corporation confessed to surrendering a staggering $22 million in ransomware demands, acquiring the decryption key necessary to unlock its compromised systems.
Worsening the situation, the attack was perpetrated by a purported associate of the notorious BlackCat criminal organization, with the group allegedly retaining a whopping 100% of the ransom payment for its supposed affiliate. UnitedHealth’s affiliate allegedly sought an additional ransom payment in exchange for keeping sensitive data under wraps, with some evidence suggesting the insurer may have complied with this demand as well.
