Criminals hit health records

CRIMINAL gangs are illegally accessing health records to steal people’s identities, a major new report on electronic data breaches reveals.

And cyber criminals have threatened to shut down busy hospitals by encrypting every patient’s electronic record so they can’t be accessed by doctors or nursing staff.

The cyber attacks create chaos when doctors can’t get hold of critical information in the middle of surgery and have brought every aspect of hospital operations to a halt.

Access is only reinstated when the hospital agrees to pay a seven-figure ransom.

The scams have come to light after global technology company Verizon released its latest global data breach report, which included Australia.

This report finds healthcare is now the only industry where employees are the main culprits in these data breaches.

Fifteen per cent of the 42,000 data breaches recorded last year involved healthcare organisations, the report says.

The revelations come as the Federal Government is preparing to automatically set up an electronic My Health record for every Australian, unless individuals expressly take action to opt out of the system.