Healthcare Hard Drives Lost

Centene Corporation, a Fortune 500 company based in St. Louis, MO, has announced that it is searching for six hard drives which are unaccounted for among its information technology assets.

The company provides programs and services for government-sponsored healthcare, including Medicaid, “the State Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP), as well as Aged, Blind or Disabled (ABD), Foster Care and Long Term Care (LTC), in addition to other state-sponsored/hybrid programs, and Medicare,” according to its announcement.

According to information posted by Centene, the missing hard drives contain personal information for approximately 950,000 patients who received laboratory services between 2009 and 2015. In addition to personal health information, the hard drives also include names, addresses, dates of birth, social security numbers and member ID numbers. Financial and payment information is not included in the information contained on the hard drives.

The company is in the process of notifying those whose information was affected. It will offer free healthcare and credit monitoring.  Centene’s corporate headquarters can be reached by calling (314) 725-4477.

If you believe that your information may have been affected, Maine Identity Services advises you to:

• Carefully examine any “explanation of benefits” statements you receive from your healthcare insurance providers.

• Make sure that any bills you receive from laboratories, physicians or medical billing services are for services YOU received.

• Place a free security freeze on your credit file with the three credit bureaus by calling:

Transunion – 1-888-909-8872

Experian – 1-888-397-3742

Equifax - 1-800-685-5000

• Order copies of your credit reports by contacting 1-877-322-8228 and continue to monitor your reports.

• File your 2015 income tax return as soon as possible to avoid becoming a victim of income tax fraud using your social security number.

Maine Identity Services, LLC provides data breach and identity theft support for data breach and identity theft victims and police departments. For more information about our services or to order our Data Breach Repair Kit® contact us at 1-855-463-4343 or visit our website at www.meidhelp.com