HHS Office for Civil Rights Director Melanie Fontes Rainer on Progress and News at OCR
ERISA Blog | Changes to the HIPAA Privacy Rules A Primer for Self-Insured Group Health Plans
Podcast - Data Privacy and Tracking Technology Compliance
Patient Data and Privacy
HIPAA Tips With Williams Mullen - Telehealth After the Pandemic
Relaxed HIPAA Restrictions For Providers Using Telehealth
Webinar: Investigating and Resolving Sexual Assaults on Campus
On July 19, Change Healthcare Ince. filed a breach report with HHS Office for Civil Rights (OCR) concerning its mammoth ransomware attack and breach. The organization’s breach report to OCR identifies just 500 individuals as...more
On July 1, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights (OCR) announced that Heritage Valley Health System, a provider in Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia, agreed to pay $950,000 to resolve...more
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
Cyber, Privacy, and Technology Report - Welcome to your monthly rundown of all things cyber, privacy, and technology, where we highlight all the happenings you may have missed....more
United Healthcare Group (UHG) CEO Andrew Witty was in a board meeting on Feb. 21 when officials interrupted with the news that Change Healthcare—a clearinghouse UHG subsidiary Optum had purchased for $1.3 billion in October...more
News Briefs - New HHS Task Force Aims to Oversee AI in Healthcare - Details are emerging on a new HHS task force faced with a monumental task: creating a regulatory structure to oversee utilization of artificial intelligence...more
It is no secret that protected health information (or “PHI”) is more and more at risk for cybersecurity attacks. In 2022 (the most recent year this statistic is available), the Department for Health and Human Services Office...more
The healthcare sector is particularly vulnerable to cybersecurity risks and the stakes for patient care and safety are particularly high. Healthcare facilities are attractive targets for cyber criminals in light of their...more
With a couple of “firsts,” the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office for Civil Rights (OCR) is signaling that it is cracking down on healthcare organizations that fail to identify and address cybersecurity...more
Just imagine: your loved one needs an emergency room, right away, but the ER is closed due to a cyberattack. This is not a scary dream, but, unfortunately, a reality of healthcare delivery, today. Just earlier this fall, a...more
On December 7, 2023, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (“HHS”) Office for Civil Rights (“OCR”) announced its first-ever settlement involving a phishing attack under the Health Insurance Portability and...more
On Oct. 31, 2023, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights (OCR) announced it had settled with Doctors’ Management Services Inc. (DMS) over a self-reported ransomware attack that occurred in...more
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office for Civil Rights (OCR) recently announced its first settlement agreement related to a ransomware attack. But it was not the ransomware that triggered OCR’s enforcement...more
Report on Patient Privacy 23, no. 11 (November, 2023) Tim DiBona clearly remembers Christmas Eve 2018 when the staff of his small firm—Doctors’ Management Service (DMS)—arrived at their West Bridgewater, Mass., office to...more
Report on Patient Privacy 23, no. 11 (November, 2023) The American Hospital Association (AHA) is urging federal lawmakers to intervene with the HHS Office for Civil Rights (OCR) so that hospitals and health systems can...more
On October 31, 2023, the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) issued a press release announcing that it has settled with Doctors’ Management Services for $100,000 following a ransomware attack that compromised the protected health...more
On Halloween, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Office for Civil Rights (OCR) announced a $100,000 settlement under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) with Doctors’...more
Privacy Briefs: June 2023 - Long-term care pharmacy network PharMerica disclosed a breach involving more than 5.8 million patients, making it the largest breach reported to the HHS Office for Civil Rights (OCR) in the last...more
A strong cybersecurity program can help defend against cyber attacks and protect sensitive patient data. Thanks to a 2021 amendment of the HITECH Act, when a breach occurs, it can also reduce enforcement penalties. The...more
CYBERSECURITY - Cyber-Attack Disrupts Public Services in Fremont County, Colorado - Government offices and public services in Fremont County, Colorado, have been disrupted since August 17, 2022, due to a “cybersecurity...more
Cyber-attacks on health care entities are becoming increasingly frequent, and the resulting data breaches are often complex. In the event of a cyber-attack, health care entities and their business associates must adhere to...more
Oklahoma State University’s Center for Health Services recently paid $875,000 to settle potential HIPAA violations after a cyberattack resulted in the unauthorized access of its patients’ protected health information. A...more
Report on Patient Privacy 22, no. 6 (June, 2022) - A report from the HHS Health Sector Cybersecurity Coordination Center (HC3) found that in early 2022, ransomware groups increasingly turned to legitimate software during...more
CYBERSECURITY - Extortion Doesn’t Work for EA Sports Hackers - According to The Record, Electronic Arts Sports (EA) was the victim of a cyber hacking in June, when hackers posted on an underground hacking forum that they...more
Echoing other agencies in recent weeks, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights (OCR) issued an alert sharing resources to address and protect institutions against the recent influx of...more