Article written by Haim Ravia, Dotan Hammer and Adi Shoval
A motion for class action certification was filed with the Tel Aviv District Court, seeking damages amid an alleged data breach involving medical information of tens of thousands of patients of healthcare providers in Israel. The lawsuit was filed against Israel’s largest and third-largest Health Maintenance Organizations (“Clalit” and “Me’uhedet”, respectively) as well as against two medical centers: Hillel Yaffe and Barzilai. It alleges that the breach was uncovered after a veterinarian who purchased used medical devices discovered that they still stored the medical history of patients. An expert opinion by a data security professional indicated that the information was not anonymized and was accessible to anyone operating these devices.
The lawsuit alleges that as a result, medical records of approximately 78,882 people were exposed. The lawsuit seeks damages of 1.5 billion NIS (approximately $440 million). The plaintiffs, all patients of the defendants, also filed a complaint with the Israeli Privacy Protection Authority.
CLICK HERE to read the motion for class action certification (in Hebrew).
