Not a day goes by without hearing about a cyber incident in healthcare. Data breaches are projected to cost the industry $4 billion by year end. At the same time, these cyber-attacks are getting more sophisticated. According to a recent xtelligent media ar ticle , attacks using the encryption-based malware – often leading to ransomware - have already doubled relative to 2018. The resulting downtime from the ransomware attacks has reached an average of 9.3 days. At the same ti

Cybersecurity has become one of the most significant financial and reputational risks for an organization. Examples of the ever-increasing cybersecurity threats include: More than 22 government entities in Texas, Florida, Maryland and Georgia faced ransomware recently Louisiana declared a state of emergency after ransomware hit many schools HHS/OCR received notification of 351 data breaches in 2018 exposing 13,020,821 healthcare records Almost 120 million new malwares are

The application of artificial intelligence (AI) to achieve predictive modeling is foreseen in almost every field. Cybersecurity is no exception. MIT researchers have demonstrated a high level of accuracy in detecting suspicious web activities where a relatively larger set of data is available and “analyst-in-loop” method is used for enhanced learning of the AI system. People have started to explore AI for medical device cybersecurity. The goal would be to monitor data traffi

Healthcare is currently the industry most susceptible to hacking. According to Gemalto’s Data Breach Index, healthcare came first in having the most data records (~ 386 million) stolen in 2016. According to a recent British Medical Journal article, 81% of 223 organizations surveyed, and >110 million patients in the US had their data compromised in 2015 alone; only half of these healthcare providers think that they are capable of defending themselves from cyber attacks, and

Here is a paragraph from a recent article, “ Fears of hackers targeting US hospitals, medical devices for cyber-attacks ”: “The popular TV show “Homeland” included a scene where the president’s pacemaker was hacked, and [cybersecurity] researchers say that threat is very real . So much so, that former Vice President Dick Cheney revealed on CBS's "60 Minutes" in 2013 that he had the wireless capability on his pacemaker turned off. ” In today’s environment where hospitals fa

Cyber attacks and data breaches in healthcare are on the rise. Security researchers have been warning about the need to secure medical devices and the impact of insecure devices on patient lives. The recent proliferations of ransomware like 'WannaCry' and 'Petya' further emphasizes the need to have a robust security policy for the most critical of the assets in a healthcare delivery organization. A recent research study published in May 2017 by Ponemon Institute* sponsored