LAHORE: Chughtai Lab has confirmed that online medical records of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif were tampered with by “nefarious elements” that added insulting remarks to their lab report.
Images, of what appeared to be laboratory reports for the former prime minister, had been circulating on social media. In the said report, the section for the residential address had been replaced with the sentence “Please return Pakistan’s looted money and freely live anywhere. Regards @endlessquest92.”
At first thought to be a doctored image, it was later pointed out that the test report bearing patient identity number 13001-19-104183295 and name M Nawaz had the same details as a lab report posted on twitter on Saturday by Maryam Nawaz Sharif.
According to a twitter statement made by Chughtai Lab, medical reports can be accessed online by using the patient identity number that is present on all printed lab reports.
Privacy of our patients lab reports is important to us. Patient results can be accessed on our servers by using patient ID information that is printed on their lab reports. That is why photos of lab reports should not be shared on social media.
— Chughtai Lab – Official (@ChughtaiLab) March 23, 2019
Using patient ID information, online reports, previous reports can be accessed. Patient address and other profile information can also be changed. In today’s episode, someone has accessed the patient’s profile and edited the address field.
— Chughtai Lab – Official (@ChughtaiLab) March 23, 2019
The patient id for Nawaz Sharif had been clearly visible in the picture of the lab report tweeted by Maryam Nawaz a day ago.
Just got back after meeting MNS. His doctor’s concern was not unfounded. The blood tests done yesterday reveal a further raise in his CREATININE levels which means his kidney function has deteriorated. His kidney disease is already at stage 3. The pain in the flanks persists. pic.twitter.com/5kdSLKxjTG
— Maryam Nawaz Sharif (@MaryamNSharif) March 23, 2019
The lab had to face serious backlash as Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) workers and supporters started the trend #BoycottChughtaiLab, saying that such behavior meant the lab could not be trusted with medical details.
However, the lab later clarified that only personal details and information such as address and phone number could be edited online and that no medical details could be changed by anyone with access to the id.
Dr Omar Chugtai of the Chughtai Lab told Pakistan Today that the matter had been handled and already been reported to the cyber crime wing of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA).
“Yesterday afternoon, the photo of one of our lab reports was shared on social media by patient’s family member. The patient ID information in that lab report was misused by nefarious elements to access the online bio-data of the patient; they replaced the address information with derogatory and inappropriate remarks” he said.
“The people who did this are in no way associated with Chughtai Lab, and we strongly condemn this act. We are reporting the matter to the relevant government authorities for swift action against the people responsible for this.”
He went on to clarify that the lab had no political affiliation with anyone, and was already working on improving their data security system. The bio-data editing option on the Chughtai Lab website has been disabled for all patients for now and updated security measures are being put in place.
It is also interesting to note that the twitter account that took responsibility for the tampering, @endlessquest92, belonging to a Syed Ahmed Iftikhar – has now been deleted.
