Essen Health Care Gets Breached and Loses Patient and Employee Data

  • By Steven
  • Published: Jun 20, 2023
  • Last Updated: Jun 20, 2023

Essen Health Care Data BreachEssen Health Care is a massive healthcare network of facilities and providers throughout New York City, Staten Island, and Westchester County. With more than 300 providers at a range of facilities connected to Essen Health Care, the organization maintains and stores a huge amount of medical and personal data for patients, providers, faculty, and more. All this data is protected by security features, but it was exposed in a recent breach. The breach puts anyone connected to Essen Health Care at risk and is a major issue everyone should know about. 

How Did the Attack Occur?

The Essen Health Care breach occurred because one or more attackers broke into the company's file servers and began harvesting information. The data taken was personal and health-related, and much of it was private and confidential. The information stolen could be used in harmful ways and is a serious risk to anyone connected to this breach. Soon after the breach occurred, the organization launched a formal investigation to determine what information was taken and how much damage could result from this breach overall. The final data taken from this investigation was disheartening. 

What Information Was Viewed or Stolen?

While exploring the full scope of this breach, investigators determined that most personally identifiable information, such as Social Security Numbers, government IDs, home addresses, phone numbers, full names, and more, was available. It's also likely that health records, insurance information, diagnoses, medication data, and more was exposed by this breach. All that data together could be very harmful if misused by the hackers that obtained it. 

How Did Essen Health Care Admit to the Breach?

Essen Health Care released a formal notice on May 16 explaining the findings from its investigation. The data likely to be exposed is included in that notice, and the people most likely to be at risk. Anyone that believes the notice applies to them should take steps to protect their data and safeguard themselves from further issues. 

What Will Become of the Stolen Information?

There's no way to know how the Essen Health Care data will be used by the attackers, but we can guess what will become of the information. The most likely use for that data will be to launch identity theft attacks, phishing scams, or to sell it to others that will misuse it instead. The data could be misused in a wide variety of ways, and it's likely it will be used in one harmful way or another. 

What Should Affected Parties Do in the Aftermath of the Breach?

If you believe that your data was involved in this breach of information, you should take immediate steps to protect yourself against identity theft. Begin by investing in credit monitoring services or by looking at recent copies of your credit reports for strange changes. You could also put a freeze on your credit for additional protection. Be careful to avoid giving away any personal data about yourself online or via text message, and you should be able to protect yourself from most problems.

About the Author
IDStrong Logo

Related Articles

Instagram Vulnerability Allowed Hackers Access to Control Your Phone

Security experts Check Point Research discovered a critical vulnerability while examining Instagra ... Read More

Alien Malware Infects More than 226 Mobile Apps and Steals Bank Data

As reported on September 24, 2020, by ZDNet and ThreatPost, a new strain of malware named “A ... Read More

Universal Health Systems Hit by Ransomware Attack

Universal Health Systems (UHS), a Fortune 500 company owning more than 400 hospitals across the co ... Read More

Exchange Server Bug Exposes a Big Risk to Hackers

Months after Microsoft released a patch to fix a serious flaw in MS Exchange Server, more than 61% ... Read More

Clients’ Bank Data Exposed in Blackbaud Ransomware Attack

Blackbaud software was victim to a ransomware attack last May, and new information suggests that c ... Read More

Latest Articles

Google Voice Scams: What They Are and How to Stay Safe

Google Voice Scams: What They Are and How to Stay Safe

Google Voice scams continue to pose a risk for users of this service. Scammers continuously attempt to lure users into divulging their verification PIN code.

What Are Pretexting Attacks: Scam Types and Security Tips?

What Are Pretexting Attacks: Scam Types and Security Tips?

Have you ever received a text from someone you do not know? Did you become alarmed by the message? Did the message contain information about you and the people you know?

What is a Time-based One-time Password (TOTP)?

What is a Time-based One-time Password (TOTP)?

Authentication is the process that verifies the user's identity to control access to resources, prevent unauthorized users from gaining access to the system, and record user activities (to hold them accountable for their activities).

Featured Articles

How to Buy a House with Bad Credit

How to Buy a House with Bad Credit

Buying your own home is the American Dream, but it might seem out of reach to those with bad credit. However, the good news is, if your credit is less than perfect, you do still have options and in most cases, can still buy a home.

How Secure Is Your Password? Tips to Improve Your Password Security

How Secure Is Your Password? Tips to Improve Your Password Security

Any good IT article on computers and network security will address the importance of strong, secure passwords. However, the challenge of good passwords is that most people have a hard time remembering them, so they use simple or obvious ones that pose a security risk.

Top 10 Senior Scams and How to Prevent Them

Top 10 Senior Scams and How to Prevent Them

Senior scams are becoming a major epidemic for two reasons. First, seniors often have a lot of money in the bank from a life of working hard and saving.

Notice

By proceeding with this scan, you agree to let IDStrong run a Free Scan of supplied parameters of your personal information and provide free preliminary findings in compliance with our Terms of Use and Privacy Notice. You consent to us using your provided information to complete the Free Scan and compare it against our records and breach databases or sources to provide your Free preliminary findings report.

Rest assured: IDStrong will not share your information with third parties or store your information beyond what is required to perform your scan and share your results.

Free Identity Threat Scan
Instantly Check if Your Personal Information is Exposed
All fields below are required
Please enter first name
Please enter last name
Please enter a city
Please select a state
Please enter an age
Please enter an email address
Close