Privacy & Security
Add Facebook to the list of Silicon Valley technology companies looking for ways to make personal health data a new part of their growth strategy. Like Apple and Google, the social network is said to be developing wellness apps, as well as health discussion groups for its 1.3 billion users.
If you think you'll be able to dodge a data breach without putting in some serious work, think again. This year, healthcare organizations have reported more breaches than ever -- a 10 percent jump, on average. So what are they doing to improve these numbers? Not nearly enough, says the Ponemon Institute.
The Health Information Trust Alliance has put out a word of warning about Shellshock, a system vulnerability it says could wreak much more damage than the infamous Heartbleed bug.
"Just by having an app on your device, (a cybercriminal) can determine your call history, take your contact list info, if they choose to." That's how vulnerable smartphones, tablets and their mobile ilk actually are, Jim Routh said, and it's not just the devices that chief information security officers like him have to worry about.
Texas Health is hardly the only hospital or health network that struggles to convince the CEO, CFO or other board members just how critical funding security initiatives and technologies really is, but it did use a unique approach to get their attention.
A Huntsville, Ala., clinical diagnostics laboratory has notified more than 7,000 individuals of a HIPAA breach after the company discovered protected health information contained on a third-party server had been unsecured for nearly three years.
With the war already underway, how can hospitals and networks prepare? Chief information security officers share insights about shifting toward more sophisticated information security tactics.
When the Office for Civil Rights knocks on your door, asking about HIPAA compliance, it pays to be ready. And OCR is looking to audit providers ranging from large to small, and across a wide geographical distribution.
Apple is expected to launch HealthKit on Tuesday along with a new iPhone and a much anticipated wearable device, called iWatch. But while the company is working hard to show that privacy rules for its new health platform offer adequate protections, recent high-profile security breaches call its efforts into question.
HealthCare.gov, the government's insurance enrollment website, was breached in July by a hacker or hackers, according to CMS officials at a briefing on Thursday. The officials said that while the intruders uploaded malware, they took no personal information.