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Vendor loses personal data on enrollees in Tenneesse’s public health care system

What happened? An unencrypted CD containing the personal information of TennCare members - who were enrolled with provider AmeriChoice - was lost in transport.

How many victims? 67,000 people.

What kind of personal information? Names, Social Security numbers, addresses and birth dates.

Details: UPS lost the package while it was in transit between Nashville and Knoxville. AmeriChoice officials said an employee failed to ensure the data was encrypted or that it was transmitted through a secure file-transfer system.

What was the response? AmeriChoice notified victims through letters. The company has since retrained employees and reviewed policies with them.

Quote: "We regret that this occurred, certainly, and we do take the privacy and security of our member's personal information very seriously. And we have taken steps that we believe will prevent this kind of occurrence from happening again." - AmeriChoice spokesman Steven Matthews.

Source: "TennCare provider loses patient information on thousands," Sept. 11, WATE.com.

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