xSocialMedia, a marketing agency on Facebook that runs campaigns for medical malpractice lawsuits, has leaked medical and other data for about 150,000 people.
vpnMentor notes that xSocialMedia might not be subject to HIPAA compliance because patients are free to disclose their health information to the parties of their choice – in this case, by inputting it into a form on one of the advertising firm’s sites.
vpnMentor says it discovered the leak on 2 June. xSocialMedia responded on 11 June and closed the database up on the same day.
What a nice bit of information to wake up to.
Check It Out: Facebook Marketing Agency xSocialMedia Leaks Medical Data
Yeah I thought that was the craziest part. What do you mean “might not be subject to HIPAA compliance?” Does personal data mean nothing anymore?
Andrew:
Just getting around to catching up with my TMO reading in days, and this is the first article I see.
Words fail. Each FB betrayal of their user base is succeeded by another even more egregious, and they never let up. Given the standards to which medical professionals and the health industry writ large are rightly held, and the oversight and regulations to which they must submit, it is beyond baffling that FB continue to engage in this space and flout all regulations, standards, safety measures, protocols, conventions and simple common sense and decency with impunity.
This one quote from the article, “vpnMentor notes that xSocialMedia might not be subject to HIPAA compliance because patients are free to disclose their health information to the parties of their choice – in this case, by inputting it into a form on one of the advertising firm’s sites. But it’s hardly likely that they would have done so if they’d known that their personal medical histories would be publicly exposed, along with data that could easily link their identities to those records…” suffices to illustrate both the unambiguous betrayal of confidentiality that people expected and the self-declared exemption to responsibility FB and their agents ascribe to themselves.
If Zuckerberg and crew were actually qualified and credentialed to do half of the health and scientific-related things they’ve done, by now they’d be wearing orange jump suits with matching cuffs and leg irons – after a fair trial, of course. Pity.
There is nothing good that would come from that combination. A trifecta of sleaze.