With President Obama pushing for more electronic medical records, Americans need to look closely at just how well guarded their personal, medical information really is.  Wikileaks reports that the Virginia Prescription Monitoring Program was hacked into and over 8 million medical records are being held for a $10 million ransom in an encrypted database.

“I have your [expletive] In *my* possession, right now, are 8,257,378 patient records and a total of 35,548,087 prescriptions. Also, I made an encrypted backup and deleted the original. Unfortunately for Virginia, their backups seem to have gone missing, too. Uhoh For $10 million, I will gladly send along the password.”

Virginia now has a statement [pdf] clarifying that the backups are fine and details [pdf] on what was stored on the files.

In October 2008, a similar event occurred.  Though smaller in nature, these types of breaches will become commonplace if everyone’s medical information is digitized.  It’s just too easy for criminals to access.  There’s so much information in medical files that it’s a goldmine just waiting to be dug through.  Sometimes, low tech, i.e. paper, is still the best way to go.

Here’s something to think about.  Identity theft.  Hacking people’s medical records.  Getting hit by a car and sent, barely conscious, to the hospital.  Do you trust electronic medical records now?