LOS ANGELES (KABC) — Approximately 13.4 million current and former Kaiser Permanente members and patients could be affected by the privacy breach, the health care provider said.
Kaiser said he has warned past and current customers, but the practice is not aware of any misuse of member or patient information.
Data that may be collected includes IP addresses, member names, and how members navigate through codes embedded in Kaiser websites and mobile apps.
Cyber experts told ABC7 that the incident is more of a privacy violation than a data breach, where criminals break into systems and steal personal information to sell.
“In the case of privacy violations, this is an example of Kaiser sharing personal data with other organizations, which in this case could be Twitter/X, Google, and Microsoft,” said director Dr. Clifford Newman. . of the USC Computer Systems Security Center.
In a statement to Eyewitness News, Kaiser Permanente said in part:
“These third-party transmissions do not include usernames, passwords, social security numbers, financial account information, or credit card numbers. Kaiser Permanente does not provide voluntary internal We conducted an investigation and subsequently removed it from the website and mobile application. ”
The group apologized to its members and said it had put safeguards and other measures in place to prevent the problem from happening again.
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