Hackers may have gained access to the personal data of more than 3,000 patient families at Children’s Hospital Colorado, the hospital in Aurora announced Friday.
The hospital said a staff member’s email account “may have been accessed by an unauthorized party” on July 11. After a forensic investigation, it was determined that some of the potentially compromised emails contained names, addresses, dates of birth and phone numbers of patients, along with “limited clinical information, such as diagnosis and treatment received.”
“Regrettably, this notice concerns an unintentional exposure of protected health information that may affect nearly 3,400 patient families,” Children’s said in its release.
The hospital said neither patient charts nor electronic medical records systems were compromised. In addition, no Social Security numbers or financial information was included in any of the emails. Children’s said it has no evidence that data in the emails has been misused or even accessed.
The hospital began informing patients of the hack on Friday and is establishing a call center to answer questions. The center will open Monday and can be reached at 888-398-6989 between 9 a.m. and 9 p.m. on weekdays.
The breach at Children’s comes the same week credit reporting agency . The company said hackers gained access to sensitive personal data – Social Security numbers, birth dates and home addresses – for up to 143 million Americans.
