VA Black Hills Health Care System

The covered entity (CE), Veterans Affairs, reported that between May 15 and 17, 2015, paper records containing protected health information (PHI) were left in an outside trash dumpster on its Hot Springs campus. The breach affected 1,168 individuals and involved names, partial and full social security numbers, addresses, and dates of birth. Following the breach, the CE destroyed the records. Although the CE complied with its breach notification requirements, as a result of OCR’s substantial technical assistance, it initiated a revision of its breach notification procedure. The CE also offered credit monitoring to the 980 veterans whose full social security numbers were potentially breached.