CHALLENGE
A national healthcare company experienced a data breach where patient information was compromised and ended up in nefarious hands. Compounding this was the fact that this data breach occurred at the same time that the company was in active and nearly finalized acquisition negotiations.
Our client needed a communications partner to collaborate with their legal counsel to help avoid any situations where public statements could be construed as an admission of liability. In addition, managing this crisis during ongoing acquisition negotiations posed a unique challenge since the client was under an increased layer of scrutiny from new investors and the stakes were very high.
STRATEGY
Red Banyan developed a comprehensive communication strategy that oversaw carefully communicated messages across multiple stakeholder groups.
The strategy focused on providing full transparency and showcased the client not only adhering to HIPAA Compliance requirements, but also going far above and beyond those requirements in order to secure all affected PII, protect patients from potential credit risks resulting from the data breach, and ensure their credibility and reputation remain untarnished so the acquisition deal would not be compromised.
RESULTS
Each of the transparency communication strategies Red Banyan implemented resulted in high praise from both legal counsel and the media – two stakeholder groups that are almost always at odds with each other.
One of our recommendations that went above and beyond HIPAA compliance included a publicly announced and widely distributed offer to provide complimentary credit monitoring to any affected patient for a full year.
Although only a small handful of affected patients accepted this offer, it was enthusiastically endorsed by the law firm representing our client in their acquisition negotiations who went on to acknowledge that Red Banyan’s crisis PR expertise helped our mutual client come out of the data breach issue intact, enabling a successful acquisition without any financial damage following the incident.