Breach filing
ArchivedGrays Harbor Community Hospital: 88,399 individuals, Aug 2019.
Grays Harbor Community Hospital reported a breach of unsecured protected health information to the HHS Office for Civil Rights on 12 August 2019. The filing records the organisation as a healthcare provider in Washington and lists 88,399 individuals affected, which makes it the 24th largest of the 185 Washington filings on the register and the 46th largest of the 511 filings submitted nationally in 2019. Among the 15 Washington filings made in 2019 it ranks 3rd.
Individuals affected
88,399
As reported to HHS
Modelled cost (IBM 2025)
$14.1M
Method shown, not disclosed
Rank in WA
24th
of 185 Washington filings
Rank in 2019
46th
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
- 88,399
- Breach submission date
- 12 August 2019
- Submission year
- 2019
- Type of breach
- Hacking/IT Incident
- Location of breached information
- Electronic Medical Record, Network Server, Other
- Business associate present
- No
- State
- Washington (WA)
- Portal status
- listed in the HHS OCR breach portal archive
- Rank in Washington by size
- 24th of 185
- Rank in 2019 nationally
- 46th of 511
- Washington median filing
- 3,950 individuals
- Register id (derived)
- WA-20190812-grays-harbor-community-hospital
Section F.2 / In context
Where this filing sits in Washington and in 2019
OCR classifies the incident as a hacking or IT incident, with the breached information held in an electronic medical record system, a network server and another location. Hacking/IT Incident is the type recorded on 117 of the 185 Washington filings (63%) and on 61% of all filings submitted in 2019. Electronic Medical Record appears on 4% of Washington filings.
No business associate is recorded on the filing; 21% of Washington filings do involve one. At 88,399 individuals the breach is 22 times the Washington median filing of 3,950 and 22 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.
Washington's breach notification statute (RCW 19.255.010) requires notice to affected residents no later than 30 days after discovery. Its attorney general threshold: more than 500 Washington 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 88,399 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 $14.1M; the 2026 edition's $192 gives $17.0M. Both are modelled estimates with the method shown, not costs disclosed by Grays Harbor Community Hospital. For scale, IBM's 2026 average cost of a healthcare breach is $6.64M, so this filing models at 2.6 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), Grays Harbor Community Hospital, reported that it was the victim of a cyber-attack involving ransomware that affected the electronic protected health information (ePHI) of 88,399 individuals. The ePHI involved included names, addresses, birthdates, drivers' license information, Social Security numbers, claims information, diagnoses, lab results, medications prescribed, and other treatment information. In its mitigation efforts, the CE implemented additional administrative and technical safeguards to better protect its PHI.
Section F.5 / Modelled cost
88,399 individuals through IBM's per-record figures
Modelled cost / method shown, not a disclosed cost
ModelledIBM 2025 customer PII, $160 per record
$14.1M
88,399 x $160
IBM 2026 customer PII, $192 per record
$17.0M
88,399 x $192
Method: individuals affected, as reported by Grays Harbor Community Hospital 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
Washington statute and the HIPAA rule
State notification statute
Washington: RCW 19.255.010
- Notice to individuals
- No later than 30 days after discovery
- Attorney general threshold
- More than 500 Washington residents (Within the same 30-day window)
- Private right of action
- Yes: Civil lawsuits under the Consumer Protection Act; actual damages plus up to $1,000 punitive for willful violations
- Penalty
- Consumers may recover damages, costs, and attorney fees; AG may seek penalties and injunctive relief
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
Washington filings closest in size
Neighbours by size rank among Washington 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| UW Medicine | Healthcare Provider | 973,024 | 20 Feb 2019 | |||
| Columbia Surgical Specialist of Spokane | Healthcare Provider | 400,000 | 18 Feb 2019 | |||
| Peoples Injury Network Northwest | Healthcare Provider | 27,000 | 12 Sep 2019 | |||
| Area Agency on Aging and Disabilities of Southwest Washington | Health Plan | 7,000 | 22 Apr 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 4311.
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.