Victim Count in Maryland Ransomware Breach Jumps Fivefold

A Berlin, Maryland-based hospital recently told regulators that a ransomware breach discovered in January had compromised the sensitive information of nearly 137,000 patients, about five times the number of people originally estimated as having been affected by the incident.

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Atlantic General Hospital provided the updated breach tally in a report submitted to Maine’s attorney general on Friday, which supplemented a March 24 filing estimating that about 30,700 people – including three Maine residents – had been affected by the ransomware incident.

The hospital now said that 32 Maine residents are among the total 136,981 individuals affected.

Some experts say the significant increase in the number of individuals illustrates the breach analysis challenges that many organizations encounter in the aftermath of a ransomware or other hacking incident.

“Obtaining an accurate count of affected individuals and determining the type of compromised data in the aftermath of ransomware incidents can be time-consuming due to the need for thorough forensic investigations, extensive data analysis, and the complexity of healthcare systems, which often involve numerous interconnected databases and sources of information,” said Jon Moore, chief risk officer at privacy and security consultancy Clearwater.

Organizations often face regulatory deadlines…