Cyber criminals are expanding their activities rapidly, from the financial sector into the medical sector, hunting for data of patients. The growing popularity of stolen data sets of individual patients can be explained by the fact that credit card details quickly can be blocked or replaced. Protected health information, which includes such sensitive information as Social Security numbers, medical record numbers, date of birth, and more, is an incredibly valuable commodity on the black market. Medical data is being sold for an average price up to $50 per individual dataset. The medical record retains much longer their value; it gives criminals the time to sell this kind of data.

Medical Information is widely shared
One factor that complicates the problem is that medical data passes through so many hands. The New York Times found that a typical patient’s medical data can be accessed by at least 30 people and organisations, ranging from physicians to pharmacies, insurers and even pharmaceutical companies.

Security needs to be at the core
Electronic medical records can be an important tool in improving the quality of care. Each of the health providers can see what the others are doing. This can avoid duplication and dangerous interactions between treatments. But without strong privacy protections, those records can do harm as well as good. Under several health care regulations, organisations must implement several technical safeguards:  control over secure access, audit, data integrity, user authentication, and transmission security. Since medical data is so valuable to thieves and the potential damage to individuals is so great, it is vital that controls and safeguards are in place to ensure data is protected throughout the health care ecosystem.

Secure authentication
Medical identity theft and the privacy of healthcare data can be prevented with a secure and convenient authentication. Strong authentication tools like two-factor authentication protect health care systems by requiring multiple forms of identification before allowing access. Next to that, organisations can both maintain control over the key access point to their data and easily manage user account credentials with an integrated identity solution. AET solutions offer unlimited secure access to healthcare providers and their patients on any device, any time, any place, anywhere.

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CIO, Healthcare IT news, Modern Healthcare, Modern Medicine