Hackers didn't retrieve data in Defense pharmacy website attack

No data has been siphoned off the Defense Department PharmacoEconomic Center website and domain as the result of a hacker attack reported by a security firm last week, a Military Health System spokesman said.

Austin Camacho, a spokesman for the TRICARE Management Activity, part of MHS, said in an e-mail that the PharmacoEconomic Center website has been taken down while security teams from the Army, which manages the center, review security flaws to identify potential vulnerabilities.

The PharmacoEconomic Center website is a public access site and does not house any personally identifiable information, nor does it contain data regarding patient drug profiles, Camacho said.

He added there is no data from the Prescription Medication Analysis and Reporting Tool, which is used to manage medication profiles, on the PharmacoEconomic Center website. Clinicians access PMART information from a separate secure server, Camacho said.

According to Camacho, the Army took down the PharmacoEconomic Center website Jan. 21 after receiving an advisory from the National Security Agency's Threat Operations Center about potential vulnerabilities reported in a blog post by Imperva, a security firm. He expects the PharmacoEconomic Center server to be back online later this week.

The Army Communications-Electronics Command also took down its website last Friday after Imperva reported the hacker attack. Bob DiMichele, a CECOM spokesman, said it will remain offline while the Army conducts an investigation to determine if a compromise did indeed occur.

DiMichele emphasized that the CECOM site taken down is the command's public domain website that hosts general information about the command's mission and organization. He said, "All information found on that site was public information and previously reviewed to ensure operational security."