Form: Cost-of-Breach DisclosureSource: IBM Cost of a Data BreachFiled: 28 Apr 2026
DataBreachCost.comOpen calc
Independent breach-cost research, read by security and risk leaders.Sponsor this site →
Filing DC-20260518-community-connectionsHHS OCR Breach Register, District of Columbia

Breach filing

Under investigation

Community Connections: 18,943 individuals, May 2026.

Community Connections reported a breach of unsecured protected health information to the HHS Office for Civil Rights on 18 May 2026. The filing records the organisation as a healthcare provider in District of Columbia and lists 18,943 individuals affected, which makes it the 9th largest of the 33 District of Columbia filings on the register and the 109th largest of the 441 filings submitted nationally in 2026. Among the 3 District of Columbia filings made in 2026 it ranks 1st.

Individuals affected

18,943

As reported to HHS

Modelled cost (IBM 2025)

$3.03M

Method shown, not disclosed

Rank in DC

9th

of 33 District of Columbia filings

Rank in 2026

109th

of 441 filings nationally

Section F.1 / The filing

As posted by HHS OCR

Every value below is the portal's own field for this filing, plus its rank within the register.

Covered entity type
Healthcare Provider
Individuals affected
18,943
Breach submission date
18 May 2026
Submission year
2026
Type of breach
Hacking/IT Incident
Location of breached information
Network Server
Business associate present
No
Portal status
listed by HHS OCR under Cases Currently Under Investigation
Rank in District of Columbia by size
9th of 33
Rank in 2026 nationally
109th of 441
District of Columbia median filing
2,416 individuals
Register id (derived)
DC-20260518-community-connections

Section F.2 / In context

Where this filing sits in District of Columbia and in 2026

OCR classifies the incident as a hacking or IT incident, with the breached information held in a network server. Hacking/IT Incident is the type recorded on 12 of the 33 District of Columbia filings (36%) and on 86% of all filings submitted in 2026. Network Server appears on 36% of District of Columbia filings.

No business associate is recorded on the filing; 27% of District of Columbia filings do involve one. At 18,943 individuals the breach is 7.8 times the District of Columbia median filing of 2,416 and 4.7 times the national median of 4,000 across all 7,884 filings. It sits in the 10,000 to 99,999 band, which holds 1,938 filings.

As of 28 August 2026 the case is listed by HHS OCR under Cases Currently Under Investigation. OCR has not published a closing summary, so this page is limited to the fields on the filing itself; the archive entry that follows a closed investigation usually adds a short account of what was exposed and what the entity did afterwards.

District of Columbia's breach notification statute (D.C. Code 28-3851 et seq.) requires notice to affected residents in the most expedient time possible and without unreasonable delay. Its attorney general threshold: 50 or more District residents. The HIPAA Breach Notification Rule ran alongside it: notice to affected individuals and to HHS without unreasonable delay and no later than 60 days after discovery, which is the clock that put this filing on the portal.

Multiplying 18,943 individuals by IBM's $160 customer-PII cost per record (Cost of a Data Breach 2025, the figure the site's calculator uses) gives a modelled $3.03M; the 2026 edition's $192 gives $3.64M. Both are modelled estimates with the method shown, not costs disclosed by Community Connections. For scale, IBM's 2026 average cost of a healthcare breach is $6.64M, so this filing models at 0.5 times the sector average.

Section F.5 / Modelled cost

18,943 individuals through IBM's per-record figures

Modelled cost / method shown, not a disclosed cost

Modelled

IBM 2025 customer PII, $160 per record

$3.03M

18,943 x $160

IBM 2026 customer PII, $192 per record

$3.64M

18,943 x $192

Method: individuals affected, as reported by Community Connections to HHS, multiplied by IBM's customer-PII cost per record (Cost of a Data Breach 2025 Figure 6 and the 2026 edition). No cost has been disclosed by the entity for this filing; the figure is a planning estimate, not a fact about the breach. IBM's per-record figures come from mid-volume breaches and IBM cautions against applying them to breaches involving millions of records; the site's per-record page explains where the multiplication holds and where it breaks down.

Context: IBM's average cost of a healthcare breach is $6.64M in the 2026 report ($7.42M in 2025); the global average across all sectors was $4.44M in 2025.

Cost per record: method and limits / Healthcare breach cost, IBM 2026

Section F.6 / Notification clock

District of Columbia statute and the HIPAA rule

State notification statute

District of Columbia: D.C. Code 28-3851 et seq.

Notice to individuals
In the most expedient time possible and without unreasonable delay
Attorney general threshold
50 or more District residents (No later than when residents are notified)
Private right of action
Yes: Treble damages or $1,500 per violation (whichever is greater), plus attorney fees
Penalty
Unfair or deceptive trade practice enforceable by the DC Attorney General; injunctive relief and restitution

The HIPAA Breach Notification Rule runs alongside the state statute: notice to affected individuals and to HHS without unreasonable delay and no later than 60 days after discovery.

Section F.7 / Peer filings

District of Columbia filings closest in size

Neighbours by size rank among District of Columbia filings in 2026, topped up from other years where 2026 has too few. Filings of 10,000 or more link to their own page.

Covered entityTypeIndividualsSubmitted
Veterans Health AdministrationHealthcare Provider19,2546 Nov 2018
Community ConnectionsOpenHealthcare Provider18,94911 Dec 2024
Children's National Medical CenterHealthcare Provider18,00024 Feb 2015
Washington VA Medical CenterHealthcare Provider1,46716 Apr 2026
World Trade Center Health ProgramHealth Plan1,0717 May 2026

Index / Companion schedules

Provenance

Source: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office for Civil Rights, Breach Portal (breaches affecting 500 or more individuals), retrieved 2026-08-28. Public domain. Individuals affected and dates as reported by the covered entity.

Portal: ocrportal.hhs.gov breach report. Statutory basis: HITECH Act section 13402(e)(4): the Secretary must post a list of breaches of unsecured protected health information affecting 500 or more individuals. Breaches affecting fewer than 500 individuals are reported to OCR annually and are not posted, so they are not on this register. Status wording follows the portal's two tabs ("Cases Currently Under Investigation" and "Archive") as of 28 August 2026; a filing moves to the archive when OCR closes the case. Modelled costs on this site are a method applied to the reported count, using IBM Cost of a Data Breach per-record figures, and are never a cost disclosed by the entity. This row: hhs-breach-under-investigation__2026-08-28.csv, export row 117.

Corrections: if you represent a listed entity and the portal row has been amended, email [email protected] with the portal entry and we will re-pull the export.