Hacks involving medical systems and databases scare me. The potential for malicious harm is huge. Despite the fact that we’ve known about the risks since the 1983 hack of Sloan-Kettering, and despite the fact that we received some troubling reminders recently with demonstrations involving pacemakers or insulin pumps, the healthcare sector still lags behind the…
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Smart move.
Following a recent data breach, Jackson Health has banned volunteers from using cell phones in patient areas.
Judge denies Kaiser access to couple's PCs in patient-files case
File this under the I-didn’t-see-this-one-coming dept.: Chad Terhune of the L. A. Times reports: In an ongoing legal battle over confidential patient data, a state judge refused to grant Kaiser Permanente access to the personal computers and email account of a couple the healthcare giant hired to store nearly 300,000 hospital files. […] In October,…
Are Cloud Service Providers Business Associates under HIPAA and the HITECH Act?
Joseph Lazzarotti writes: As more companies move to the cloud, regulatory compliance remains a critical issue. For cloud service providers to the healthcare industry, it looks like the requirement to comply with the HIPAA privacy and security rules as business associates will be confirmed when long-awaited final regulations are issued, based on a report by Marianne Kolbasuk McGee with Healthcare Information…
Shades of 2003: Have contractors started holding individuals’ PII hostage again?
It’s been a long time since I’ve seen any report that a contractor or their employees were holding an organization’s client or patient data hostage as part of a dispute. To my surprise, however, there have been two such reports like that recently. One case is in the healthcare sector and I’ll be blogging about…
Patient privacy and political musings
Erin McCann writes: Since 2005, some 60 million Americans have had their private health information compromised or disclosed electronically – a fact that has privacy experts, political players and consumers alike demanding reform. In an epoch of health IT, is the government doing enough to address and quell the privacy worries of the American people?…