By Bob Grant – HHS Office for Civil Rights has released new guidance about how HIPAA-beholden entities can better equip themselves to deal with ransomware attacks. Ransomware is a targeted kind of malware attack that takes data ‘hostage.’ The attackers responsible then give the organization a countdown to a time at which they expect to receive a ‘ransom’ in exchange for restored access to the withheld data.
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By Matt Fisher – After promising to provide guidance and insight for a breaking issue, the OCR came out with ransomware guidance under HIPAA. One major issue for debate was whether a ransomware attack constitutes a HIPAA breach. The guidance provides insight into where OCR is coming from and what it expects the industry to do in response to a ransomware attack.
Since January 2016, hospitals in three states and the District of Columbia have been maliciously attacked and patient health data has been put at risk. These cyberattacks are a result of “Ransomware”, a malware system designed to “kidnap” data, prevent victims from accessing their information, and extort them for the decryption key.
The Health Information Trust Alliance (HITRUST), the leading organization supporting the healthcare industry in advancing the state of information protection, has released findings from an industry pilot to evaluate methods to improve the collection and sharing of cyber threat Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) and enable their effective consumption by a broad range of organizations.
By Bob Grant – In the past 90 days, there have been five separate instances of hospitals in the US and Canada being hit by ransomware attacks. The most recent of these instances affected MedStar Health, which is the largest health care provider throughout the Maryland and Washington, D.C. area.
By Art Gross – The topic of ransomware, especially ransomware hitting healthcare organizations, is making headlines daily. Dan Munro has a very good article over at Forbes that asks an important question: Is Ransomware Considered A Health Data Breach Under HIPAA?
By Irv H. Lichtenwald – Mathematically, the gap between $3.6 million and $17,000 is a chasm. This is something you know well if you’re Hollywood Presbyterian Hospital, which paid the latter number to unlock patient data held hostage by malicious hackers using ransomware.
By Matt Fisher – sits down with Mac McMillan, the Chairman, CEO and co-founder of CynergisTek, Inc., to discuss cybersecurity issues facing the healthcare industry. The discussion focused on ransomware, the role of data in healthcare, which includes where generated and how utilized, and how to manage access to data.
By Art Gross – Last month a hospital in Hollywood, CA was a victim of a ransomware attack that left computers unusable for over a week. According to a ZDNet article, the Southern California hospital was unable to practice its usual day-to-day operations.