Over the years, there have been countless cases of HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) violations, which can result in significant financial penalties. Most are directly linked not to accidental employee misconduct or malicious intent but to a lack of understanding of HIPAA standards by healthcare organizations. Most cases involve poor implementation of security controls or lack of risk assessment auditing, to save money and avoid costly auditing.

From on-demand healthcare services like telehealth to wearable technologies, predictive healthcare to blockchain technologies for electronic health records, or 5G for healthcare services to AI and augmented reality for state-of-the-art medical treatments, the healthcare industry is at an inflection point. These digital transformations also bring along elevated cybersecurity risks.

HIPAA compliance is regulated by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and enforced by the Office for Civil Rights (OCR). In 2013, the final Omnibus rule was enacted, binding business associates - or third-party vendors - to the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. This modification added another level of compliance complexity to an industry not accustomed to operating in the cybersecurity domain - the healthcare industry.

The healthcare industry has been a favored target for cybercriminals for many years. In the first half of 2022 alone, 324 attacks against healthcare organizations have been reported. Attackers have primarily focused on large hospitals in years past, but there has been a sudden switch to smaller healthcare companies and specialty clinics. There seems to be a clear trend in attacks against the healthcare industry, and that trend includes targeting smaller healthcare companies and clinics.

Healthcare organisations in the United States are being warned to be on their guard once again, this time against a family of ransomware known as Venus. An advisory from the United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has warned that the cybercriminals behind the Venus ransomware have targeted at least one healthcare entity in the United States, and are known to be targeting publicly-exposed Remote Desktop Servers.

U.S. Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) issued the 35-page report Cybersecurity on Patient Safety on November 3, which called the ongoing transition to better cybersecurity for the healthcare sector as being painfully slow and inadequate. This is despite the fact the healthcare sector is uniquely vulnerable to cyberattacks.

As the healthcare industry becomes more digitally inclined, there’s a need for systems to be put in place to avoid breaches in the security of data records. Most healthcare organizations are already embracing the DevOps (Development and Operations) model, but unfortunately, security seems to be neglected, resulting in data breaches and numerous cyber attacks on software and mobile applications.

Healthcare organizations collect and accumulate data rapidly. This makes data protection in healthcare so difficult. The more data you have, the more privacy and security risks there are. Data breaches can affect your organization’s reputation. They can also incur major costs. For instance, HIPPA violations can be as much as $1.5 million yearly. And they will hold you – the healthcare provider – responsible for data breaches.

The impact of ransomware attacks on healthcare is as alarming as it is under-addressed. The United States healthcare system alone faces an annual burden of nearly $21 billion due to these attacks. It pays well over $100 million in ransoms, and is beginning to acknowledge the tragic realities of impacted patient care, including higher patient mortality rates. For every headline related to cyberattacks, there are likely hundreds more that go unreported.