Seacoast Radiology Notifies Customers After Security Breach

By Author: Peter Martin
Total Articles: 211
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It is not uncommon for attackers to target websites, servers, computer systems and network to acquire control, gain unauthorized access, breach sensitive data or install malicious software. However, servers of a health service provider, Seacoast Radiology were targeted recently, by attackers to capture space and bandwidth. The purpose of the attack was to acquire additional space and bandwidth to play an online game - Call of Duty: Black ops.

Usually, organizations avail the services of ethical hacker certified professionals to identify the security flaws. In this case, the IT security experts found that the affected server contained sensitive personal information such as patient names, social security numbers, medical diagnosis codes, mailing addresses, phone numbers, billing procedures codes and other records of around 2,30,000 patients. Fortunately, the affected server did not contain any banking information. However, the available data on the servers can be misused by the hackers. While the attackers had no malicious intentions, even accidental data breach may have serious financial and personal repercussions on ...
... the affected individuals. Further, such attacks also result in disruption of services and adversely affect the credibility of an organization. The authorities at Seacoast Radiology have notified all patients whose records were stored on the affected server.

Often organizations find it difficult to ascertain, whether unauthorized access to servers has led to data breach. Lack of proper awareness among employees regarding incident handling may lead to loss of volatile evidence from the affected computers. Online computer training programs programs may help employees understand security threats and first responder procedures in the event of a breach.

Compromised information may be used by attackers for identity theft, stealing money, blackmail and other forms of fraud. IT Professionals who have undertaken security certification programs may help organizations in restructuring the security infrastructure to combat different types of threats emanating in the IT environment.