Change Healthcare Cyberattack
This article was updated on June 24, 2024.
Health insurance giant UnitedHealth Group confirmed a ransomware attack on its subsidiary, Change Healthcare (CHC). The cyberattack began on February 21 and continues to disrupt hospitals and pharmacies nationwide.
Change Healthcare continues to address the matter and is working to understand the impact on members, patients and customers. Change Healthcare has a high level of confidence that only Change Healthcare was affected by this issue and that Optum, UnitedHealthcare and UnitedHealth Group systems are unaffected.
In a recent statement, Change Healthcare said, “We are working on multiple approaches to restore the impacted environment and will not take any shortcuts or additional risk as we bring our systems back online. We will continue to be proactive and aggressive with all our systems and if we suspect any issue with the system, we will immediately take action and disconnect. We will provide updates as more information becomes available.”
On June 20, CHC began providing notice to customers whose members’ or patients’ data was involved in the incident. In late July, CHC plans to send direct notice (written letters) to affected individuals for whom CHC has a sufficient address.
To meet HIPAA requirements, CHC has provided a substitute notice link for customers to add to their website to provide information about the incident for their patients/members even if they have not been identified as impacted: https://www.changehealthcare.com/hipaa-substitute-notice.
The notice helps individuals understand what happened and gives them information on steps they can take to help protect their privacy, including enrolling in two years of complimentary credit monitoring and identity theft protection services.
More information, including frequently asked questions for CHC customers and individuals, is available here: changecybersupport.com. Call center support is also available Monday through Friday, 8:00 a.m. – 8:00 p.m. at 1-866-262-5342.
Yeo & Yeo will provide an update when more information becomes available from Change Healthcare.