Chattanooga Heart Institute reports data breach impacting over 170,000
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The Chattanooga Heart Institute (CHI) reports it has experienced "data security incident". The institute received a threat claim from the Karakurt hacker group, asserting that they had targeted CHI and successfully exfiltrated a substantial 158 GB of data.
While there was no concrete evidence supporting the claim, Karakurt stated that the private information of employees and patients would soon be made available to the public.
This included sensitive data such as:
- names
- medical records,
- test results,
- diagnoses,
- social security numbers,
- passports,
- addresses,
- phone numbers,
- financial details
CHI reported that approximately 170,450 individuals, were affected by the data security breach. CHI detailed the event on its website, referring to it as a "cyberattack."
Per CHI's report, they first detected indications of the cyberattack on April 17 and promptly initiated their response plan. An external forensics firm assisted in the subsequent investigation, which revealed that unauthorized access to the network occurred between March 8 and March 16. However, it wasn't until May 31 that they discovered that protected health information of patients and guarantors had been obtained. The investigation did not find any evidence suggesting that the data had been retrieved from the EMR (Electronic Medical Records) system.
CHI is currently in the process of reviewing files in detail, and notifications to all affected individuals are expected to be sent out in the coming weeks. Those who receive notifications will be offered credit monitoring and identity theft restoration services to help mitigate potential risks.
CHI's notification does not disclose any information regarding a ransom demand from the known criminal group, Karakurt. Additionally, there is no mention of patient data potentially surfacing on the dark web.
