Addison County Home Health & Hospice Data Breach (2019)

Vermont's Addison County Home Health & Hospice notified 758 patients that some of its PHI got exposed due to an email security breach recently. email security breach has been discovered on Apr. 26, 2019. Addison County Home Health & Hospice secured the account immediately and began an investigation. One topmost cyber security company was hired to help in determining what has happened and what kind of information may be there in the compromised email account. The investigation has revealed that unauthorized access to email account of an employee was gained first on Feb. 19, 2019. However, the investigation was not able to determine whether that unauthorized individual has actually viewed any emails in that compromised email account. The data breach notice to the consumers also said that "in an abundance of caution, we reviewed all emails and attachments in the account to find information that may have been accessible to the unauthorized person". The analysis of those emails in that compromised email account revealed they contain the names, clinical information, as well as for some patients, Social Security numbers and medical record numbers.