It is now October and the year has almost come to an end. How fast this year has gone by and unfortunately, many thousands have been involved in countless identity theft scams and data breaches, including the following reported last week…

The Boston Globe is reporting a recent data breach that affects tens of thousands of health care providers, including physicians. The information that has been compromised does include social security numbers.

A stolen laptop is the culprit. “It took some time to figure out what type of data was on the laptop,’’ said Tara Murray, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Massachusetts spokeswoman. “There is no reason to be believe the data has been used to steal people’s identity, but we are just being cautious . . . to notify them and offering free credit monitoring.’’

It is being reported that providers in Massachusetts were notified by letter in October, once Blue Cross-Blue Shield became aware of the data saved onto the laptop. The company does require that all information be encrypted, however, this copy was downloaded by an employee who saved an unencrypted version. The company is dealing with the matter accordingly and reviewing procedures that will help to improve the security of company data.

If you do not currently monitor your own credit and wish to enroll in LifeLock, use promo code DEFENSE to receive a 30-day free trial and discount.

This entry was posted on Monday, October 5th, 2009 at 9:51 am and is filed under Data Breach. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.