Privacy Series: HIPAA Breaches - When It Is, and When It Is Not a Breach
Compliance Perspective: What's New in Healthcare Privacy
Over the course of the past few months, the Office of Civil Rights (OCR) and the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC), both of which are divisions of the U.S. Department of Health and...more
According to the 2022 State of Ransomware Report issued recently by Sophos, it surveyed 5,600 IT professionals from 31 countries, including professionals in the health care sector. Those professionals in the health care...more
Cyberattacks against healthcare providers accounted for 79% of all reported data breaches in 2020. (See here). The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS) Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and...more
Regulatory bodies are upping the ante when it comes to settling with companies that have suffered data breaches. In addition to the below settlements, see also the settlement between the OCR and Dignity Health....more
With apologies to John Donne, ask not for whom the bells tolls, HIPAA business associates, it tolls for thee! While it has been the law for some time that business associates could be held directly liable for breaches,...more
Health care organizations continue to be a popular target for hackers. According to information from the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (HHS), over 30 reports of data breaches have been filed by health care...more
It is being reported that LifeLabs, a Canadian lab company that is the largest provider of laboratory diagnostics and lab testing services in Canada, recently paid an undisclosed ransom to hackers who compromised its computer...more
The Office for Civil Rights (OCR) announced that it has fined the Texas Health and Human Services Commission (TXHHS) $1.6 million for HIPAA violations. This is one of the few fines the OCR has levied against a state agency....more
In accordance with the Inflation Adjustment Act, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has updated its regulations to reflect required annual inflation-related increases to civil monetary penalties, including...more
Health care providers operate in one of the most highly regulated industries in terms of compliance and governmental oversight. As a result, providers face a number of regulatory and compliance challenges each year....more
Regulators, industry experts, and researchers provided insight into health privacy and security enforcement trends, emerging threats, and new tools at a recent conference focused on the Health Insurance Portability and...more
Consistent with our experience, security firm McAfee has confirmed in a report that ransomware attacks have doubled in 2019. Medical providers have been hit hard this year, and one provider, Wood Ranch Medical, located in...more
What have you done for me lately? Now that the tune is stuck in your head, specifically, have you recently conducted a thorough and up to date risk assessment in accordance with the requirements of the Health Insurance...more
Medical Informatics Engineering, Inc. and its wholly-owned subsidiaries (MIE) and the Office for Civil Rights at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS-OCR) entered into a $100,000 settlement and two-year...more
Enforcement activity by the Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS) Office for Civil Rights (OCR) showed no signs of slowing throughout 2018 and has already picked up speed in 2019. More recent and significant actions...more
According to a February 12, 2019 Press Release from Protenus, a developer of analytics for patient privacy monitoring and compliance, 15,085,302 patient records were breached in 2018 – a startling number made even more...more
The Office for Civil Rights (OCR) at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services recently announced that 2018 was a significant year in Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) enforcement activity. ...more
On February 7, 2019, the Office of Civil Rights (OCR) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services published the resolution agreement for its final HIPAA settlement of 2018. ...more
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) estimates that U.S. health care systems lost around $6.2 billion in 2016 due to data breaches. Congress and HHS have recently taken affirmative steps towards reducing that...more
Just before the new year, the Department of Health and Human Resources (HHS) released voluntary cybersecurity practices for health care organizations, which consists of a main document, two technical volumes, and resources...more
Health care organizations’ lack of compliance with the data privacy and security requirements of both state laws and the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (“HIPAA”) Privacy, Security and Breach Notification...more
A relatively quiet year for HIPAA enforcement is ending with a small flourish. The Office of Civil Rights of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has announced two settlements with covered entities within the...more
A lawsuit has been filed by the attorneys general of 12 states against a company called Medical Informatics Engineering (MIE) arising out of a 2015 data breach involving stolen medical records for millions of individuals. The...more
The Office for Civil Rights has announced that it has fined Lakeland, Florida based Advanced Care Hospitalists (ACH) $500,000 for an impermissible disclosure of protected health information by one of its business associates. ...more
The health care industry is racing to adopt cutting-edge technology to provide patients with the best treatment possible at the lowest possible cost. ...more