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Computer virus copied thousands of Alberta health records

by Karl Gotthardt - albertacowpoke | July 9, 2009 at 03:14 am

390 views | 65 Recommendations | 14 comments

Alberta is the first Province in Canada that has gone into Electronic Health Records in a big way. Other Provinces will eventually follow, Ontario is delayed for some time because of scandals over consultants, but that's another story.

11,000 health records have been compromised by a virus entering the Alberta Electronic Health Care Computer System. Apparently the virus was on the system for two weeks without detection.

Alberta Health Care claims the Core Flood Virus was modified, making it difficult to detect. They also said that they cannot guarantee that it will not happen again.

Core Flood is a seven year old program that downloads information onto a server in Southern Russia. The program seeks primarily financial information, passwords, etc.

Alberta Health Services claims that no financial data was on these files. Employees that used the Alberta Health Services Computer to do bank transactions may be in trouble.

This should open up the debate about Electronic Health Records again.

More on Core Flood here

The personal health information of thousands of Albertans was skimmed from the Alberta Health Services Edmonton network in May as a computer virus infected the network.

Alberta Health Services has sent letters to the 11,582 people whose information may have been captured by the virus between May 14 and May 29.

Notification has been sent by mail and should be received within the next seven business days.

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neilabraham

at 04:42 on July 9th, 2009

Any data that is stored online is at risk of being compromised. If in doubt, keep your important data on a network not connected the public internet. Then this doesn't happen.

Karl Gotthardt - albertacowpoke

at 05:03 on July 9th, 2009

Agreed Neil. I a government agency, as in this case Alberta Health Services, maintains your records there you have no control over it.

158

at 07:11 on July 9th, 2009

This shows technology can be used for good or bad.

Byteme (not verified)

at 07:40 on July 9th, 2009

Coreflood is a backdoor trojan that CAN allow a Denial of Service attack...not an information stealing hack.

The official commnet from AHA was that screen shots of data were captured...that's not consistant with the payload of coreflood.

Karl Gotthardt - albertacowpoke

at 07:45 on July 9th, 2009

Thanks for this Byteme.

sara star

at 07:46 on July 9th, 2009

Our personal health information should not be on computer, since it is supposed to be kept confidential. I am not a computer whiz, but couldn't a person just keep their own info on their own computer, and bring it with them when they go to the hospital?

I resent the fact that my stuff is on computer, really for anyone to see.... even my employers.

It is not private, like it is supposed to be.

Karl Gotthardt - albertacowpoke

at 07:59 on July 9th, 2009

Thanks for this Sara, the problem is that the information can be used by your employer and insurance companies. I.m anxiously waiting to see if I.m one of those compromised.

Karl Gotthardt - albertacowpoke

at 08:24 on July 9th, 2009

It just might , thanks for commenting:)

Amy Judd

at 08:49 on July 9th, 2009

Wow, already this has happened - that's not good.

Karl Gotthardt - albertacowpoke

at 08:54 on July 9th, 2009

Thanks for commenting Amy:)

sivakaran

at 11:42 on July 9th, 2009

that's a global threat. Hope no further damage occurs to employees or patients.

Barbara McPherson

at 12:58 on July 9th, 2009

The BC gov't is trying to get the public to buy into this online records too. If we take the attitude that anything online can be hacked then the info is out there for anyone determined to get it. The company the BC gov't is favoring is an American company. Any info that the US gov't may want on an individual is up for grabs under the Homeland Security umbrella. You can imagine the mischief that this could cause someone.

Karl Gotthardt - albertacowpoke

at 13:00 on July 9th, 2009

Thanks for you comments Barbara. A lot of our bank records and credit cards are already being administered in the US.

Elly22 (not verified)

at 09:39 on September 24th, 2009

That is awful and dangerous, a computer virus can potentially ruin your entire system not to mention get access to all your personal documents, its a scary thing and people should be more prepared and aware especially when it comes to a system that has as many personal files as the alberta health care has. For those worried about virus, adward, spyware etc then I recommend this informative article to give tips and information about how to be more protected, lets fight these hackers!
- - factoidz.com/how-to-secure-your-computer-and-prevent-antivirus-malware-adware-and-spyware/ - -