Approximately 46,000 patients’ health information breached, U.S. dental chain hit by cyberattack

Source: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office for Civil Rights Breach Reporting Portal

DentalGoodNews｜Recently, Hawaii Family Dental, a dental chain in Hawaii (hereinafter referred to as "Hawaii Family Dental"), issued a data security incident notice. The notice states that the organization suffered a hacker attack between July 19 and 20, 2026, resulting in unauthorized access to the personal and protected health information (PHI) of approximately 45,853 patients.

According to Hawaii Family Dental's official notice, the company first identified suspicious activity in its computer network on July 20. A subsequent professional forensic investigation confirmed that an unauthorized third party breached the system during the brief period of July 19 to 20 and accessed data repositories containing sensitive patient information.

The scope of leaked information involved in this incident is relatively broad, including patient names, phone numbers, residential addresses, personal emails, dates of birth, medical and dental treatment records, and health insurance-related information. Hawaii Family Dental emphasized that highly sensitive information such as affected patients' Social Security numbers (SSN) and financial accounts was not involved, and there is currently no evidence that the leaked information has been illegally misused.

After the incident, Hawaii Family Dental immediately took measures to isolate the affected systems and reinforce network defenses. The company stated that it is currently comprehensively reviewing and upgrading its data privacy and security protection mechanisms to reduce the risk of similar security incidents occurring again in the future. Affected patients are receiving formal breach notification letters by mail.

Regarding the identity of the hackers, although Hawaii Family Dental's official notice did not directly name them, the ransomware and data theft group Qilin has publicly claimed responsibility for the incident and claimed to have leaked some sensitive data.

Hawaii Family Dental is headquartered in Honolulu and is one of the larger dental healthcare providers in Hawaii, operating more than ten clinics. Currently, the organization has submitted breach reports to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office for Civil Rights (OCR) and other necessary regulatory agencies in accordance with relevant laws and regulations.