The Washington Department of Social and Health Services (DSHS) has identified an insider data breach involving unauthorized access to the protected health information of approximately 8,600 individuals.

Insider threats are a major problem in healthcare, more so than in other sectors. While most insider incidents are unintentional, and snooping on medical records is a common cause of healthcare data breaches. Patient records may also be obtained for financial gain. Regular workforce HIPAA training is important to remind employees of their responsibilities with respect to patient privacy, and employee access logs should be routinely monitored. Without active monitoring, these privacy violations can persist for long periods before unauthorized access is identified.

In this case, a DSHS employee was discovered to have accessed a DSHS internal client data system without authorization and viewed records containing full names, dates of birth, Social Security numbers, DSHS client numbers, and information about DSHS program enrollment.

The DSHS investigation found no evidence that health information was accessed, such as diagnoses, test results, treatments, claims, or chart notes. The DSHS said the employee was found to have accessed records for “reasons unrelated to their job duties,” but did not elaborate further on the individual’s reasons for access. It is also unclear when the unauthorized access was detected, or for how long the employee had been accessing records for non-work purposes.

DSHS confirmed that action was immediately taken when the privacy violations were identified, preventing further unauthorized access. DSHS has confirmed that the individual is no longer working for the department. It is unclear whether the employee was terminated over the HIPAA violation or if they left voluntarily.

DSHS said it is issuing notification letters by mail to all affected individuals and encourages them to monitor their account statements and credit reports for unauthorized activity. DSHS is cooperating with state and local law enforcement in their ongoing investigation. DSHS said steps are being taken to implement additional safeguards, and internal policies and procedures related to data privacy and security are being reviewed.

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A hacking incident has been reported by South Florida Injury Centers, and Chickasaw Nation Department of Health has discovered that an employee accessed patient data without authorization.

South Florida Injury Centers

South Florida Injury Centers, Inc., a medical practice with locations in Tamarac and Port Saint Lucie that specializes in treating patients injured in automobile accidents, has recently reported a hacking-related data breach to the HHS’ Office for Civil Rights that has affected up to 1,525 patients.

While few details have been released about the incident, this appears to have been a cyberattack by the threat actor Kairos. Kairos is a financially motivated threat group that engages in data theft and extortion, breaching networks, exfiltrating data, and demanding payment to prevent the data from being leaked online. The group has conducted attacks on several healthcare organizations and claims to have exfiltrated 45 GB of data from South Florida Injury Centers.

South Florida Injury Centers was added to its dark web data leak site on April 7, 2026, along with samples of the stolen data, which appear to contain redacted patient information such as names, contact information, driver’s license numbers, Social Security numbers, and medical histories. Kairos proceeded to leak the stolen data, indicating that the ransom was not paid.

Chickasaw Nation Department of Health, Oklahoma

Chickasaw Nation Department of Health in Oklahoma has identified an insider patient privacy incident that was first identified on April 22, 2026. An investigation was promptly initiated when unauthorized access to patient records was identified, and immediate steps were taken to prevent further unauthorized access.

The review of access logs confirmed that the privacy breach was due to the actions of a single employee, who had accessed patient records without authorization between December 1, 2025, and April 22, 2026. During that time, the records of 1,607 patients may have been accessed without authorization.

The information viewed included patient names, ages, dates of service, tribal affiliations, reasons for visits, and clinical information such as lab and radiology orders. No evidence was found to indicate that full Social Security numbers were viewed. The website notification about the privacy incident does not state the actions that have been taken against the employee over the privacy breach.

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