As hacking and cyberattacks continue to occur and lead to healthcare data breaches, technical safeguards are become increasingly important for healthcare organizations.

As a refresher, the technical safeguards, as defined by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) in the HIPAA Privacy Rule, are “the technology and the policy and procedures for its use that protect electronic protected health information and control access to it.” 

The technical safeguards, while in some respects inconvenient and seemingly daunting to implement, are good best practices to protect your environment, and most importantly your critical data and in the case of a healthcare provider that is ePHI. By simply walking through a risk assessment and implementing the Policies, Procedures and requisite technologies most providers would be 75% of the way further than most businesses in protecting themselves.

According to the healthcare data breach database maintained by the Office of Civil Rights (OCR), the top 10 healthcare data breaches for this year were caused by hacking or health IT related incidents, highlighting an industry-wide need for better technical safeguards.

To help providers and covered entities understand the rule better we will be posting a series of blog articles outlining the HIPAA Security Rule in simple terms, and continuing to educate you on the path to compliance.

Stay tuned.