The DEA has been made aware by our former dental provider, Healthplex, that a recent security incident may have involved some of our members’ personal information. Healthplex discovered that one of their employees was a victim of a phishing attack resulting in unauthorized access to the employee’s email account. After completing a comprehensive review of the data potentially affected by the unauthorized access, Healthplex determined that on April 5, 2022, DEA members’ personal information may have been impacted by this incident.
The DEA took precautions many years ago in safeguarding our member data whereby no social security numbers were fed to Healthplex for eligibility purposes. Instead, the DEA assigned a simple member “counter” number that was provided to Healthplex so that social security numbers did not reside on Healthplex’s computer system.
Healthplex will be sending each affected DEA member a letter explaining the matter and they will also offer any affected member free “LIFELOCK Identity Theft Protection Services” which proactively protects your personal and financial information and provides comprehensive recovery services if you should become a victim of identity theft during your LIFELOCK complimentary membership.
Lastly, Healthplex has established a dedicated toll-free hotline should you have any questions. You may reach them at (866) 540-5917, Monday through Friday, between 8:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. EST.
The DEA is working closely with Healthplex to monitor the situation and will provide you with any updates as we learn of them.