Ascension Seton investigating data breach
AUSTIN, Texas - Ascension Seton has notified people of a data breach that happened in March.
On March 2, 2023, Ascension Seton was alerted to a security event involving its website that was managed by a third party vendor, Vertex, that happened on March 1-2.
Vertex hired a forensic investigator to review how access to encrypt the information was obtained. Vertex also notified law enforcement about the event and is continuing to cooperate with them.
Due to the nature of the incident and the encryption, Ascension Seton does not have details about affected information. However, demographic information such as name, address, email address, phone number, insurance information, Social Security number (or tax identification number), or other clinical information would have been affected if this information was provided by people on the websites, Seton.net and DellChildrens.net.
At this time, Ascension Seton does not believe any information was removed from the affected systems or that it has been misused or shared. Ascension networks and medical record systems were not affected by this incident.
"We take the protection and safeguarding of information seriously and have taken steps to ensure this kind of incident does not happen again," Ascension Seton said in a statement. "We reviewed our processes for vendor hosted websites and shut down the affected sites, creating new ones hosted by Ascension, as well as reviewed the type of information collected on these sites."
Ascension notified affected individuals and provided complimentary credit and identity theft protection services to those who had Social Security numbers, credit card information and/or insurance numbers impacted by the incident.
They also recommended individuals review credit and identity theft protection measures.
If anyone has additional questions, please contact the dedicated assistance line, toll-free at 866- 547-1504, Monday through Friday, between 8 a.m. and 5:30 p.m. Central time, excluding major U.S. holidays.