Lost in transit: Georgia disk with 2.9M records missing

A disk containing 2.9 million records of Georgia residents that belonged to the state's Medicaid contractor, Affiliated Computer Services Inc., has been lost while being moved from one facility to another.

The disk, which state officials said was shipped March 22, was on its way from Georgia to a contracting facility in Maryland. ACS did not learn the disk was missing until April 3, said David Shapiro, a company spokesman.

The Dallas-based contractor subsequently notified state officials that the disk was missing on April 9, said Dena Brummer, a Georgia Community Health Department spokeswoman.

Shapiro declined to name the shipping company used, other than to say it is "a major carrier."

The disk contained names, addresses, birth dates, and Social Security and Medicaid identification numbers of people on Medicaid and PeachCare, the state's child healthcare plan, Brummer said.

Shapiro would not say whether the data was encrypted.

"Both ACS and the shipper are going through a 24/7 investigation," said Shapiro, noting that searching for lost items in the mail can often take days or weeks. When this kind of event occurs, "you just don't look at the tracking number," he said. "It involves scouring various sites [along the] route."

So far there is no indication that any unauthorized person has the data or that the data has been misused, Shapiro said.

The state has published notices informing Georgia residents of the missing data and also is requiring ACS to notify by mail all affected residents, Brummer said.