Breach filing
ArchivedThe Methodist Hospitals, Inc.: 68,039 individuals, Oct 2019.
The Methodist Hospitals, Inc. reported a breach of unsecured protected health information to the HHS Office for Civil Rights on 4 October 2019. The filing records the organisation as a healthcare provider in Indiana and lists 68,039 individuals affected, which makes it the 23rd largest of the 200 Indiana filings on the register and the 54th largest of the 511 filings submitted nationally in 2019. Among the 13 Indiana filings made in 2019 it ranks 2nd.
Individuals affected
68,039
As reported to HHS
Modelled cost (IBM 2025)
$10.9M
Method shown, not disclosed
Rank in IN
23rd
of 200 Indiana filings
Rank in 2019
54th
of 511 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
- 68,039
- Breach submission date
- 4 October 2019
- Submission year
- 2019
- Type of breach
- Hacking/IT Incident
- Location of breached information
- Business associate present
- No
- State
- Indiana (IN)
- Portal status
- listed in the HHS OCR breach portal archive
- Rank in Indiana by size
- 23rd of 200
- Rank in 2019 nationally
- 54th of 511
- Indiana median filing
- 3,600 individuals
- Register id (derived)
- IN-20191004-methodist-hospitals
Section F.2 / In context
Where this filing sits in Indiana and in 2019
OCR classifies the incident as a hacking or IT incident, with the breached information held in email. Hacking/IT Incident is the type recorded on 119 of the 200 Indiana filings (60%) and on 61% of all filings submitted in 2019. Email appears on 25% of Indiana filings.
No business associate is recorded on the filing; 31% of Indiana filings do involve one. At 68,039 individuals the breach is 19 times the Indiana median filing of 3,600 and 17 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 in the HHS OCR breach portal archive. OCR's closing summary of the case is reproduced in full below.
Indiana's breach notification statute (Ind. Code 24-4.9) requires notice to affected residents without unreasonable delay, no more than 45 days after discovery. Its attorney general threshold: all qualifying breaches. 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 68,039 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 $10.9M; the 2026 edition's $192 gives $13.1M. Both are modelled estimates with the method shown, not costs disclosed by The Methodist Hospitals, Inc.. For scale, IBM's 2026 average cost of a healthcare breach is $6.64M, so this filing models at 2.0 times the sector average.
Section F.3 / OCR closing summary
The portal's archived description, in full
Written by the Office for Civil Rights when the case was closed and reproduced verbatim from the HHS export.
The covered entity (CE), The Methodist Hospitals, Inc., reported that two of its employees were victims of an email phishing attack affecting the protected health information (PHI) of 68,039 individuals. The PHI involved included names, dates of birth, Social Security numbers, drivers' license information, passport numbers, financial information, health insurance information, diagnoses, lab results, and other treatment information. The CE notified HHS, affected individuals, the media, and established a dedicated call center for questions or concerns. The CE also offered credit monitoring and identity theft protection services to affected individuals. In its mitigation efforts, the CE implemented additional administrative and technical safeguards and retrained its staff on the proper methods of identifying fraudulent email communications. OCR obtained assurances that the CE implemented the corrective actions noted.
Section F.5 / Modelled cost
68,039 individuals through IBM's per-record figures
Modelled cost / method shown, not a disclosed cost
ModelledIBM 2025 customer PII, $160 per record
$10.9M
68,039 x $160
IBM 2026 customer PII, $192 per record
$13.1M
68,039 x $192
Method: individuals affected, as reported by The Methodist Hospitals, Inc. 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
Indiana statute and the HIPAA rule
State notification statute
Indiana: Ind. Code 24-4.9
- Notice to individuals
- Without unreasonable delay, no more than 45 days after discovery
- Attorney general threshold
- All qualifying breaches (Within the 45-day consumer notification window)
- Private right of action
- No: Enforced exclusively by the Indiana Attorney General
- Penalty
- Up to $150,000 per deceptive act, plus investigation costs
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
Indiana filings closest in size
Neighbours by size rank among Indiana filings in 2019, topped up from other years where 2019 has too few. Filings of 10,000 or more link to their own page.
| Covered entity | Type | Individuals | Submitted | Breach type | Location | BA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Talley Medical Surgical Eyecare Associates, PC | Healthcare Provider | 106,000 | 24 May 2019 | |||
| Select Health Network | Business Associate | 56,790 | 13 Nov 2019 | |||
| LCP Transportation, Inc | Business Associate | 54,528 | 15 Mar 2019 |
Index / Companion schedules
13 HHS breach register
→Hub: every filing, by state, year and entity.
04 Biggest breaches
→Mega-breaches with primary-source cost figures.
Industry / Healthcare
→IBM 2026: $6.64M average, 13 years at #1.
Regulation / HIPAA penalties
→OCR enforcement tiers and the 60-day rule.
11 50-state laws
→Deadline, AG threshold and penalties per state.
Cost / Per record
→Where the per-record model is reliable.
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-archive__2026-08-28.csv, export row 4239.
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.