A ransomware attack at a Texas hospital that knocked out phone and email systems for weeks is now even worse following OakBend Medical Center’s admission that hackers downloaded data from the medical records of up to 500,000 individuals.
The Texas medical system says it doesn’t believe that cybercriminals were able to remove complete medical records, but hackers did obtain personal and medical information and, in some cases, Social Security numbers and birthdates.
In a Thursday breach notification statement, OakBend warned current and former patients they’re at heightened risk of receiving spam messages. The hospital reported the breach to the Department of Health and Human Services on Oct. 28 as an email hacking incident.
The early September attack forced OakBend to limit communications with the outside world by yanking its email and phone systems offline for several weeks.
