Form: Cost-of-Breach DisclosureSource: IBM Cost of a Data BreachFiled: 28 Apr 2026
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Filing NC-20260324-coastal-carolina-health-care-paHHS OCR Breach Register, North Carolina

Breach filing

Under investigation

Coastal Carolina Health Care, PA: 110,304 individuals, Mar 2026.

Coastal Carolina Health Care, PA reported a breach of unsecured protected health information to the HHS Office for Civil Rights on 24 March 2026. The filing records the organisation as a healthcare provider in North Carolina and lists 110,304 individuals affected, which makes it the 23rd largest of the 207 North Carolina filings on the register and the 36th largest of the 441 filings submitted nationally in 2026. Among the 18 North Carolina filings made in 2026 it ranks 3rd.

Individuals affected

110,304

As reported to HHS

Modelled cost (IBM 2025)

$17.6M

Upper bound, method shown

Rank in NC

23rd

of 207 North Carolina filings

Rank in 2026

36th

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
110,304
Breach submission date
24 March 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 North Carolina by size
23rd of 207
Rank in 2026 nationally
36th of 441
North Carolina median filing
3,679 individuals
Register id (derived)
NC-20260324-coastal-carolina-health-care-pa

Section F.2 / In context

Where this filing sits in North Carolina 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 130 of the 207 North Carolina filings (63%) and on 86% of all filings submitted in 2026. Network Server appears on 45% of North Carolina filings.

No business associate is recorded on the filing; 26% of North Carolina filings do involve one. At 110,304 individuals the breach is 30 times the North Carolina median filing of 3,679 and 28 times the national median of 4,000 across all 7,884 filings. It is one of 801 filings of 100,000 or more individuals.

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.

North Carolina's breach notification statute (N.C. Gen. Stat. 75-65) requires notice to affected residents without unreasonable delay. Its attorney general threshold: all breaches (Consumer Protection Division of the AG). 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 110,304 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 $17.6M; the 2026 edition's $192 gives $21.2M. Both are modelled estimates with the method shown, not costs disclosed by Coastal Carolina Health Care, PA. Because the filing is above the roughly 100,000-record range in which the per-record figure is reliable, the result is an upper bound, not an estimate: fixed costs are spread across far more records at this scale.

Section F.5 / Modelled cost

110,304 individuals through IBM's per-record figures

Modelled cost / method shown, not a disclosed cost

Upper bound

IBM 2025 customer PII, $160 per record

$17.6M

110,304 x $160

IBM 2026 customer PII, $192 per record

$21.2M

110,304 x $192

Method: individuals affected, as reported by Coastal Carolina Health Care, PA 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

North Carolina statute and the HIPAA rule

State notification statute

North Carolina: N.C. Gen. Stat. 75-65

Identity Theft Protection Act

Notice to individuals
Without unreasonable delay
Attorney general threshold
All breaches (Consumer Protection Division of the AG) (Concurrent with consumer notification)
Private right of action
Yes: Civil action under N.C. Gen. Stat. 75-16 as an unfair and deceptive trade practice; treble damages
Penalty
Treble damages for affected individuals; AG may seek injunctive relief, penalties, 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

North Carolina filings closest in size

Neighbours by size rank among North Carolina 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
Lumexa ImagingHealthcare Provider5,830,94915 May 2026
Networking Technology, Inc.OpenBusiness Associate353,84429 May 2026
East Carolina Anesthesia AssociatesOpenHealthcare Provider19,40812 Mar 2026
Volvo Welfare Benefit PlanHealth Plan16,99116 Mar 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 198.

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.