Richland County says 2023 data breach impacted more than 75,000 county residents

Richland County in South Carolina said it experienced a data security incident that compromised the sensitive personal information of more than 75,000 individuals.

In a data security incident notice published on its website, the County said that on October 4 last year, it identified unauthorised activity in its internal network and immediately launched an investigation, with assistance from external cyber security experts, to determine the nature and scope of the incident.

“After an extensive forensic investigation and manual document review, on August 1, 2024, we discovered that certain impacted files containing personal information may have been accessed and/or acquired by an unauthorised individual between September 28, 2023 and October 26, 2023,” it said.

The compromised data included county residents’ names, addresses, phone numbers, fax numbers, email addresses, dates of death, dates of birth, Social Security numbers, tax identification numbers, driver’s license or government identification numbers, passport numbers, financial account information, financial account PIN/Security Codes, routing numbers, payment card numbers, payment card expiration dates, CVV and Security codes, usernames and passwords, license plate numbers, VIN numbers, medical information, health insurance information, prescription information and biometric information.

In a filing with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office for Civil Rights, Richland County said that it has identified at least 76,365 individuals who were affected by the data security incident. The County did not reveal how the breach occurred or whether it was a victim of a ransomware event.

While Richland County found no evidence of the compromised information being misused, it advised all affected individuals to regularly monitor their credit reports, account and benefit statements and report any suspicious activity to law enforcement authorities, including the police and state attorney general.

It has also offered complimentary identity protection and credit monitoring services to all individuals whose Social Security Numbers were compromised during the incident.