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Federal Cybersecurity Efforts Seek to Improve Protection of Health Data Oct 23 2023

 

Read the article in the Journal of AHIMA

https://journal.ahima.org/page/federal-cybersecurity-efforts-seek-to-improve-protection-of-health-data

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Health-ISC pulled quote:

Errol Weiss, chief security officer at the Health Information Sharing and Analysis Center (Health-ISAC), says he’s not surprised the federal government is getting more involved in healthcare cybersecurity. Health-ISAC is a global, non-profit organization that offers a forum for sharing cyber threat intelligence and best practices.

“It’s just not about patient safety. It’s also about public safety and even national security,” says Weiss, who spoke about cyber threats to healthcare organizations at the AHIMA23 Conference on Oct. 9 in Baltimore. His session will be presented on Oct. 27 during the AHIMA23 Virtual Conference. “When things start to go wrong locally, there could be a domino effect. When a hospital is impacted by ransomware, it defers patients to another hospital. When that second hospital becomes overwhelmed, it defers to a third hospital and so on. The issue starts impacting a larger area.”

Weiss says he hopes innovations that come from the DIGIHEALS project will include self-healing network technology that would detect and fix problems such as an outdated security patch. This technology can help take the burden off existing information technology (IT) staff, particularly in small, rural hospitals that are sometimes most vulnerable to cyberattacks, he says.

“I’ll be interested to see what comes out of the DIGIHEALs project,” Weiss says. “Big companies can afford to throw all kinds of money at this type of technology. Can we get to the point where it’s a much more affordable commercial product—something that small organizations can afford on their own? I guess that’s the idea here—to commercialize advanced technology.”

 

 

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