Coding Error Exposed Personal Info Of 1.8M Texans With Workers’ Compensation Claims

The personal information of almost 2 million Texans who filed claims with the Texas Department of Insurance was exposed and publicly available for nearly three years, according to a state audit released last week.

The department said the personal information of 1.8 million workers who have filed compensation claims -- including Social Security numbers, addresses, dates of birth, phone numbers and information about workers’ injuries -- was accessible online to members of the public from March 2019 to January 2022.

TDI officials said the department was in the midst of a regularly scheduled data management audit when the department discovered the unauthorized disclosure and reported it to auditors.

On March 24, after the state’s audit was completed, TDI posted a public notice acknowledging it became aware of the issue in January, the auditor’s office said.

The incident occurred because of an issue in the programming code in the department’s web application that manages workers’ compensation data.