Hospital worker charged with stealing patient identities
A 38-year-old former worker at New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center was charged with stealing and subsequently selling personal data on patients.What type of personal information? Names, Social Security numbers, phone numbers.
How many victims? Nearly 50,000.
What happened? Dwight McPherson, 38, used his access rights to tap into the hospital's computer registration system. Authorities caught on to the crime when postal inspectors discovered printouts of the data during an unrelated investigation in Atlanta. McPherson later admitted that he was selling the data in exchange for cash.
Details: Hospital officials said none of the data contained health information and they were not aware of any cases where the stolen data was used for fraud.
Source: Associated Press, Man charged in ID theft at NY hospital, April 12.
