Identity Theft Update

An announcement from Aetna detailing the theft of sensitive personal infor­mation of l30,000 plan members from a field office of a company that provides medical claim audit services highlighted a year of data loss and theft throughout the insurance industry in 2006.
More than 10 such announcements from insurers were reported last year as Companies dealt with the fallout of cus­tomer privacy missteps including the loss of names, addresses, birthdates, drivers license numbers and social security numbers of its insured. Some instances included loss of sensitive medical information.

Aetna’s December announcement of late October event was the second for the company in 2006.

In May 2006, the company also reported the loss of information of 38,000 of its members resulting from a theft of an employee’s laptop.

Other insurers reporting data breeches last year included Aflac, Allstate, American Family Insurance, American Insurance Group (AIG), Blue Cross - Blue Shield, Kaiser Permanente, Progressive Casualty Insurance, Sentry Insurance Virginia Bureau of Insurance and Wellpoint.

The announcements of each of these data loss incidents typically included the disclaimer that any personal information would be difficult to access by thieves, with many adding that the sensitive data was simply part of a burglary of property that could be sold for cash and that identi­ty theft was not an intended goal. But with identity theft three times greater than the aggregate of all U.S. property crimes (burglary, larceny and motor vehicle theft), the cause for concern is high.