The Australian Clinical Labs Ltd (ASX: ACL) share price is crashing deep into the red on Thursday.
In morning trade, the pathology services provider's shares are down 12% to $3.12.
Why is the Australian Clinical Labs share price sinking?
The Australian Clinical Labs share price has been sold off today after the company revealed that it was the victim of a cyber incident all the way back in February!
According to the release, the company Medlab Pathology business, which was acquired in December 2021, has experienced a "notifiable cyber incident" involving personal information of some of its patients and staff.
Australian Clinical Labs has conducted a forensic analysis of the affected information and has determined that personal information of approximately 223,000 individuals has been affected. This group of individuals is largely confined to New South Wales and Queensland.
The company has released a summary of the records breached of most concern. They are:
- ~17,539 individual medical and health records associated with a pathology test
- ~28,286 credit card numbers and individuals' names (Of these records ~15,724 have expired and ~3,375 have a CVV code)
- ~128,608 Medicare numbers and an individual's name
Australian Clinical Labs advised that the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) has been notified and both the OAIC and the Australian Cyber Security Centre (ACSC) are being kept up to date.
The company also highlights that there is no evidence of misuse of any of the information or any ransom demands, to date. But as we have seen with Medibank Private Ltd (ASX: MPL), that could change quickly.
As mentioned above, the company revealed that it was actually first aware of unauthorised third-party access to its IT system all the way back in February but did not inform patients or the share market. Even worse, this customer data was found on the dark web in June but once again the company chose not to notify patients or investors.
This was because it has apparently taken its forensic analysts and experts four months "to determine the individuals and the nature of their information involved."
Australian Clinical Labs' CEO, Melinda McGrath, said:
On behalf of Medlab, we apologise sincerely and deeply regret that this incident occurred. We recognise the concern and inconvenience this incident may cause those who have used Medlab's services and have taken steps to identify individuals affected. We are in the process of providing tailored notifications to the individuals involved. We want to assure all individuals involved that ACL is committed to providing every reasonable support to them. We will continue to work with the relevant authorities.
