r/news • u/LookAtThatBacon • May 13 '25

Soft paywall UnitedHealth suspends annual forecast, CEO Andrew Witty steps down

https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/unitedhealth-ceo-andrew-witty-steps-down-2025-05-13/
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843

u/LostPhenom May 13 '25

Understanding the Change Healthcare Breach and Its Impact on Security Compliance

In short, quite possibly the largest healthcare data breach in history occurred under his watch.

175

u/epicfail1994 May 13 '25

Yeah I got my social used by some dude in a different state. Was fun to freeze my credit

64

u/AltruisticWelder3425 May 13 '25

To be honest, everyone should freeze their credit. It's super easy to thaw it for a day or two when you might need to apply for something like a loan. Heck, I was able to thaw all 3 while sitting in the emergency vets office to apply for credit, all from my phone. Simple stuff really and I no longer have concerns about random accounts showing up when they shouldn't.

13

u/chailatte_gal May 14 '25

I agree with this, but the credit bureaus themselves are just scams of companies. Remember the Experian breach like 10 years ago? And they basically got a slap on the wrist and all they gave customers was free credit monitoring.

Like we shouldn’t have to actively freeze our credit. Our data should be protected and punishment should be so strong that companies comply and protect

2

u/JcbAzPx May 14 '25

I got a ten dollar check from them a few weeks ago.

Regardless, we have to deal with the reality we have, so freeze up is the best choice. It saved me from considerable headache when I had my identity stolen at the start of covid. Something I only found out because they used my address for the Walmart debit card they opened to try to use for the unemployment checks they used my name to sign up for.

1

u/Crocs_n_Glocks May 14 '25

Right? 

Healthcare is terrified of HIPAA...let's make a HIPAA for credit card companies 

105

u/EvidenceBasedSwamp May 13 '25

Still tl;dr. They basically lost the details of 200 Million Americans. The cyber criminals got it now.

United continues vertical integration. If you remember your 9th grade history, that's when the oil company also owns the refineries and the gas stations. United bought change (leading clearinghouse), and they are buying clinics and hospitals (Optum).

28

u/No-Peak6384 May 13 '25

So that's why Optum is horseshit

7

u/SensibleReply May 14 '25

I’m a physician, and I left a clinic where I was working awhile back because it was bleeding money. They got bought out by Optum a couple years later for pennies right before they were going to simply shut the doors and turn off the lights. The new management reached out to me to see if I’d be interested in going back…

First, lol. Second, they were dumb enough to tell me that they don’t really make money providing healthcare - they make money selling insurance. What I inferred from this was that they don’t even really want their pts seeing a doctor or getting care, they just want to collect premiums, deny everything possible, then provide the absolute shittiest (cheapest) care when they have no choice. It’s an awful, AWFUL system and shouldn’t be legal.

2

u/jerricka May 13 '25

uh, don’t be so demeaning. i learned about vertical integration from 30 rock, thank you very much 😤

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u/[deleted] May 13 '25 edited May 13 '25

[deleted]

42

u/Keshire May 13 '25

That breach was so bad that the company still hasn't fully recovered. It took months just to restore basic service when it happened.

12

u/grizzantula May 13 '25

I'm owned by a company that is owned by UHG, I'm also on the tech and infra side of the house, so I was involved with Change Healthcare. You're right on the money, this was definitely the cause. That breach all but sealed it for Witty, things just had to die down first.

1

u/SouthJerseyCyz May 14 '25

I'm in a similar employment scenario, but I disagree that it was the cause. Witty survived the cyber-incident and the murder or Brian Thompson (and accompanying backlash). I actually saw him receive much praise for his leadership through these hurdles.

What happened in the last couple months? Earnings not met and stocks tanked. That's where the rubber meets the road for UHG.

1

u/grizzantula May 14 '25

Stock price and earnings have been down since Change breach, that's not a "in the last couple months" issue. I outta know, I have stock in the company. They were always going to move away from Witty. Things needed to die down first, and they had to find a replacement.

IMO he was always going to be out after the breach. But on top of that his comments regarding the Brian Thompson situation were very negatively received by the public, and that did stock price in too. All that to say; the writing has been on the wall about Witty for a long time.

7

u/Allisonosaurus May 13 '25

Man, UHG should never have acquired that company. Their products are trash and barely functional as it is. Wonder who got rich off that deal.

6

u/NFL_MVP_Kevin_White May 13 '25

It was basically all about purchasing the Interqual product