GREENWOOD VILLAGE, Colo. — A Greenwood Village medical practice is warning other businesses after cyber thieves stole its identity to make fraudulent charges on victims' credit cards.
The phones have been ringing off the hook for a week at DTC Family Health, but the calls are not from patients.
"It did not involve any of our patients," said Dr. Lynn Joffe, who has owned the practice for 24 years. "None of our patients could get through on the phone. We were getting endless back-to-back phone calls complaining about the situation."
She soon learned that hundreds of people worldwide were receiving small, fraudulent charges on their credit cards from a DTC Family Health with the same phone number.
"We are victims of cyber identity theft and did not make these charges," Joffe read from the alert now posted on her website's home page.
The Greenwood Village Police Department confirmed it is investigating how a cybercriminal stole DTC Family Health's identity to steal people's money.
"It was cyber identity theft, meaning someone representing themselves as DTC Family Health made the charges," wrote Megan Copenhaver, a Greenwood Village PD spokesperson. "GVPD is encouraging victims to contact their card issuer immediately to report any fraudulent charges."
Reports show cyber incidents involving small medical practices have dramatically increased. A recent report from the Department of Health and Human Services showed that cybercriminals target these businesses because they are "generally less prepared to detect, respond, and recover from cyberattacks."
Joffe believes many people don't want to challenge medical charges, although some of the people who received fraudulent charges have been threatening her staff.
"Most of the charges are on Discover cards. We do not even accept Discover cards. So again, I want to reassure everyone that this was not our personal data breach. This was an identity theft issue," said Joffe. "I want to let other small medical businesses know this can happen to any of us."
Discover has not yet responded to our request for comment on how this sort of identity theft could happen.
Additionally, victims can report the unauthorized charges to police by contacting Detective Tori Bojczuk at vbojczuk@greenwoodvillage.com or calling 303-773-2525.
