October 4, 2011 at 7:57 am · Filed under Compliance
By Evy Schwartz
When are health care companies going to learn that they must comply with the latest laws and regulations? HIPAA and HITECH were passed for a reason but time-after-time we see data breaches happening due to violations.
The latest debacle happened right here in San Antonio, TX. Tricare, a provider of health care services to active and retired military personnel, disclosed that a 3rd party technology contractor lost backup tapes containing sensitive patient health information while transferring them between Federal facilities. Well, lost may be the wrong word. The tapes were actually stolen…out of a car. And of course the data is not encrypted.
So in today’s world of advanced technology and strict regulations, we continue to see these data breaches happen. Approximately 4.9 million Read the rest of this entry »
It’s been a long day at work and you’re mentally drained. All you want to do is join your friends for a relaxing dinner out. Someone suggests Margarita’s. Definitely, it’s the perfect choice. After dinner, drinks and good conversation, you’re ready to start another day at work.
The next day, though, you get a call from your credit card company. They want to confirm that you’re charging $2,500 at an electronics store in a nearby city. What? Well, apparently your credit card has been compromised along with 200 other Margarita’s customers’ cards.
The days of rooms filled with medical information in paper files are dwindling away. The old school paper & pen method of keeping medical records is now being replaced by electronic data management systems.
Keeping information secure should be a top priority for those in the health care industry. Personal Health Records (PHRs) include all of the medical data managed by individuals in the medical field and includes such things as health details, diagnoses, conversations with your doctor, treatment plans, medications, etc. The bottom line is that this information should only be Read the rest of this entry »
Most of you would agree that when it comes to money, making sure it’s protected and secure is paramount. The stakes are even higher if you’re a financial services firm. The margin for error is nil. That’s why many financial services institutions have deployed managed file transfer solutions to exchange their data going way beyond the security and performance criteria you or I would personally use.
Unfortunately, we still read about (and some of us experience) financial firms whose security is breached. Aside from the fines and legal penalties, they can suffer the worst fate of all, loss of their customers and a loss of trust.
Data encryption. You’d think encrypting data, otherwise known as cryptography, would be a given for any organization. And, doesn’t it seem obvious that organizations handling highly sensitive information should use the best data encryption methods available? Well, surprisingly, that’s not always the case.
Here’s an example—it was just reported that the personal information of 3.5 million Texans was just compromised. The problem: data wasn’t encrypted as it was transferred from agency-to-agency.
Sensitive information such as social security numbers and dates of birth were left exposed on a public server for months before being discovered on March 31st. Texas Comptroller, Susan Combs, has stated internal procedures were not followed. Data is required to be encrypted by Texas administrative rules established for all agencies. But somehow, this data flew under the radar.
Managing data transfers in an ever-changing IT environment is no easy task. As your business scales in both size and in technical requirements, you need the ability to manage, secure and automate how your data moves in and out of your network.
Like any business, you also have a unique set of data transfer requirements for moving around important information. The key to ensuring your data is safely and efficiently being sent and received from your offices and those of your customers and partners is your ability to adapt to a variety of technical demands and fulfilling evolving security mandates.
Securing critical business data from sinister cyber attacks is important to every organization. Unfortunately, today’s malware threats don’t lend themselves to yesterday’s security solutions. Modern malware is stealthier and better at bypassing even the most trusted antivirus software products on the market.
As reactive antivirus solutions become more ineffective against threats, a shift has occurred in the endpoint security mindset toward a proactive approach. Application whitelisting leads the proactive approach, and has become a widely accepted security and operational alternative to the traditional blacklist-based antivirus model. Read the rest of this entry »
Designing new products is a collaborative effort that requires the ongoing exchange of ideas. With business partners located around the world, it’s usually unrealistic to regularly meet in person, cost prohibitive to mail project files back and forth, and difficult to ensure that a project stays on schedule. Finding ways to quickly and securely exchange files electronically plays a critical role in the success of a project.
Time to market is essential to any industry, particularly retail where meeting deadlines is paramount to their business success. Collaborating with several outside designers on go-to-market products, a global retailer sought to improve both the communications and the way it exchanged files on new apparel and accessory designs with its designers.
CEO Jim Morris discusses the vital role of managed file transfer (MFT) technology in supporting ad hoc exchange of data, and in meeting security and compliance mandates.
CEO Jim Morris offers thoughts on how the government, private industry and information security vendors must work together to improve national cyber security.
