[author: Jane Anderson]
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The Florida Healthy Kids Corporation (FHKC), a Medicaid managed care plan, said one of its vendors, Jelly Bean Communications Design, experienced a security incident spanning seven years that involved “several thousand” Medicaid applicants. Jelly Bean Communications was responsible for hosting the Florida Healthy Kids website during the hacking incident, the managed care company said. “FHKC was notified on December 9, 2020, that several thousand applicant addresses had been inappropriately accessed and tampered with,” said a statement from the managed care company. “These addresses are collected as part of the online Florida KidCare application.” There is no evidence that any applicant’s personal information was removed from the system, according to FHKC. After an independent investigation, “cybersecurity experts identified significant vulnerabilities in the hosted website platform and the databases that support the online Florida KidCar
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Many of the major health data breaches added to the federal tally so far this year involve business associates, continuing a trend in recent years.
The largest breach added so far in 2021 to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services HIPAA Breach Reporting Tool website – which lists health data breaches affecting 500 or more individuals – is a vendor hacking incident reported on Jan. 29 by Florida Healthy Kids Corp., a provider of children s health and dental health plans in Florida.
That breach – reported as affecting 3.5 million individuals - involved Jelly Bean Communications Design, a website hosting vendor that the health plans provider says failed to address vulnerabilities over a seven-year period, leaving patient data potentially exposed. Plus, the hackers tampered with some of that data, Healthy Florida Kids Corp. said in its breach notification statement last month.
Florida Healthy Kids announces cybersecurity incident
WTXL
and last updated 2021-01-28 18:54:38-05
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (WTXL) â The Florida Healthy Kids Corporation announced Thursday a cybersecurity incident experienced by its vendor, Jelly Bean Communications Design.
Jelly Bean Communication Design was responsible for hosting the FHKC website at the time of the incident, a press release said.
The security incident involved the personal data of online applicants and enrollees, but FHKC said they have no confirmation of anyone s personal information being removed from the system. FHKC was notified on December 9, 2020, that several thousand applicant addresses had been inappropriately accessed and tampered with, the press release said. These addresses are collected as part of the online Florida KidCare application.