The breach involving 80 million records at the nation’s second-largest health insurer fulfilled the warnings many have offered for years: there is no such thing as a secure electronic health information system.
Large numbers have a tendency to concentrate the minds of policymakers and consumers, so here are a few more. Before the hack at Anthem, healthcare data breaches had already affected more than 40 million Americans in just five years. In 2014, nearly four million more health records were stolen than in any previous year. And the rate of breaches keeps increasing as sophisticated criminals – often operating outside the United States – launch daily attacks on electronic health information systems using the information to commit identity theft and fraud. – read more