Following the unprecedented data breach at Change Healthcare in February, the office of Alaska Attorney General Treg Taylor is sharing consumer protection resources and raising awareness of ways consumers can protect their personal information.
The national revenue and payment cycle management company Change Healthcare is a part of UnitedHealth, one of the nation’s biggest electronic data clearinghouses. The February cyberattack on the entity interrupted operations for thousands of doctors’ offices, hospitals, and pharmacies, and resulted in the leak of up to a third of Americans’ health and personal data. The exact number of those impacted is still unknown.
The Attorney General’s office shared the following potential warning signs that someone is using your medical information:
- A bill from their doctor for services they did not receive;
- Errors in their explanation of benefits statement like services they never received or prescription medications they do not take;
- A call from a debt collector about a medical debt they do not owe;
- Medical debt collection notices on their credit report that they do not recognize;
- A notice from their health insurance company indicating they have reached their benefit limit;
- Or if they are denied insurance coverage because their medical records show a pre-existing condition they do not have.
“You may not have heard of Change Healthcare before, but that does not mean your data was not affected,” said Taylor. “Your provider or insurer may have been a Change Healthcare customer.”
Taylor’s office said that because of the wide reach of the breach, “the safest course of action is to assume that your information has been involved.”
Change Healthcare is offering all Alaskan residents who may have been affected by the breach two years of free credit monitoring and identity theft protections.
For more information about these resources visit changecybersupport.com or call 1-888-846-4705.
If consumers are concerned about their personal data, they can also request a freeze on their credit, which prevents creditors — such as banks or lenders — from accessing their credit reports. This can prevent identity thieves from taking out new credit cards or loans in consumer’s names, as creditors will not approve those requests if they cannot access credit reports. Credit bureaus are legally required to allow consumers to place and remove a credit freeze for free.
Cyberattacks in the health care sector have been on the rise, with data breaches affecting the protected health information of nearly 38 million consumers in 2024 alone, according to the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services Office for Civil Rights.
