Advocate Aurora Health, the largest hospital system in Illinois and Wisconsin, said data for an unspecified number of its 3 million patients was breached.
In a statement, Advocate officials said they “are not aware of any misuse of information” from the recent incident.
In a statement on its website, the hospital system blamed the use of tracking technology from sources such as Facebook and Google that was intended to “evaluate information concerning the trends and preferences of its patients as they use our websites.”
“These technologies disclose certain details about interactions with our websites, particularly for users that are concurrently logged into their Google or Facebook accounts and have shared their identity and other surfing habits with these companies,” Advocate said in the statement.
Technology installed through patient portals on MyChart and LiveWell websites and apps and some scheduling software “transmitted certain patient information” to third-party vendors of Advocate.
The hospital system disabled the technology and “launched an internal investigation to better understand what patient information was transmitted.”
“We take patient privacy very seriously, employ robust internal controls to protect patient data and are committed to compliance with all laws applicable to our operations,” Advocate said in a statement to the media.
Advocate said it is re-evaluating the tracking technology, which has shown to be problematic at other institutions.
“Like others in our industry, we have used internet tracking technologies to improve the consumer experience across our websites and encourage individuals to schedule necessary preventative care,” the media statement added. “We are thoroughly evaluating the information we collect and track.”
In August, Northwestern Memorial Hospital was sued in federal court over similar data breach issues, Crain’s Chicago Business reported.
