Company’s ‘mailing error’ exposes health information of kids on Missouri Medicaid
A vice president for
"The letters contained personally identifiable health information including (the) child's name, age and provider name," said the letter from
Webster's letter, which he said he was required to send by law, was postmarked
It says there is no evidence suggesting the exposed information was misused, but WellCare is nonetheless offering members one year of free credit monitoring from Experian.
The letter also advises Missouri Care members to keep an eye on credit card bills, monitor bank accounts for unauthorized activity and not answer "emails asking for personal details or other information."
"As we continue to investigate the scope of the incident, we are taking steps to prevent something like this from happening again," Webster's letter says. "Missouri Care is deeply committed to protecting our members' privacy, and we apologize for any inconvenience this incident may have caused."
"This isn't a situation where diagnoses were disclosed or account information, or full clinical reports (were disclosed)," Roth said. "So it's more limited in nature, but I agree, personally, with their decision to notify individuals."
Roth said health care organizations do a risk assessment after identifying potential data breaches to determine whether they should self-report them. WellCare notified the media because of the size of the breach, she said.
"You always notify the individuals (affected)," Roth said. "In cases where more than 500 individuals are involved in a jurisdiction, then you also notify the media at the same time."
Missouri Care plans cover about 275,000 people throughout the state and focus mainly on children and pregnant women.
It's the second straight year that a mailing error has exposed the data of Missouri Care members. Last August the company reported a similar breach of 1,223 members' information that the company blamed on a subcontractor, O'Neil Printing. No health information was exposed in that breach, but names, dates of birth and Medicaid account numbers were.
WellCare also offered one year of free credit monitoring after that incident.
"Often that's about the only thing that you can do," Roth said. "Clearly in cases where there's been Social Security Numbers disclosed or financial account numbers disclosed the credit monitoring is, in my opinion, always appropriate. But even here, with the child's name, age and provider, it looked to me like they were offering credit monitoring to essentially mitigate any harmful effect that might occur."
___
(c)2018 The Kansas City Star (Kansas City, Mo.)
Visit The Kansas City Star (Kansas City, Mo.) at www.kansascity.com
Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
OPINION: Nathan Crabbe: The era of bland centrists is over
Flash flooding affects Crisis Center of Johnson County after Wednesday storms
Advisor News
Annuity News
Health/Employee Benefits News
Life Insurance News