Data Breach at Shields Health Care Group Impacts 2 Million Patients

Shields Health Care Group has informed roughly two million individuals of a cybersecurity incident that potentially impacted their personal data.

The Massachusetts-based firm provides management and imaging services to more than 50 healthcare partners and facilities throughout New England.

In a data breach notice published on their website, Shields said the incident was identified on March 28, 2022, but the intrusion actually happened between March 7 and March 21.

Although a security alert was triggered on March 18, the company did not find evidence of an intrusion at that time. The current investigation, however, showed that a third-party had unauthorized access to certain types of data.

Potentially impacted information, the company says, includes full names, addresses, birth dates, Social Security numbers, diagnosis, billing information, provider details, insurance number and information, patient ID, medical record number, and other medical data.

Shields says it secured the impacted systems immediately after learning of the incident, and also launched an investigation to determine the full scope of the breach.

The company’s notice does not include information on the number of potentially impacted individuals, but Shields informed the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) that two million patients were affected.

Shields reported the incident to HHS in late May, but the Department did not add it to its portal until this week, according to DataBreaches.

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