Dec 10, 2019   SOURCE: PR NewsWire

2020 HIPAA Guide from SecurityMetrics Bridges Healthcare IT Communication Gap to Protect Patient Data

OREM, Utah, Dec. 10, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- By the middle of 2019, the number of protected health information (PHI) breaches at healthcare organizations had already doubled the total of 2018, according to the Protenus Breach Barometer. Targeted phishing campaigns, insider negligence, and third-party vendor vulnerabilities continue to drive these compromises.

Healthcare organizations are busy, often lack security resources, and are frequent data breach targets. These organizations need a resource that will help them understand and implement security measures they must take to keep PHI safe.

SecurityMetrics has released their 2020 Guide to HIPAA Compliance to help healthcare organizations close security gaps and prevent data breaches. The 2020 HIPAA guide helps healthcare IT and HIPAA leaders understand how to comply with the HIPAA Security, Privacy, and Breach Notification Rules-such as best practices for conducting risk assessments, training employees, testing incident response plans, and improving network security.

The updated 2020 guide includes more insights from HIPAA security analysts, improved diagrams and graphs, and a new section on cloud security for healthcare organizations. The 2020 HIPAA Guide covers the practical steps organizations need to handle the following:

    --  Incident response plans
    --  PHI encryption
    --  Business associate agreements
    --  Mobile device security
    --  Cloud security
    --  HIPAA-compliant emails
    --  Remote access
    --  Vulnerability scanning
    --  Penetration testing

With new 2019 research data, this guide helps direct healthcare where to look for the highest risks, for example, insecure remote access hacks continue to plague healthcare, yet 60% of the organizations surveyed did not require multi-factor authentication for remote access applications. And, only 23% of organizations surveyed conduct internal HIPAA assessments.

SecurityMetrics Principal Security Analyst Jen Stone (MCIS, CISSP, CISA, QSA) says, "Our goal with the 2020 HIPAA Guide is to bridge the communication gaps that healthcare IT and management face everyday. We want the healthcare sector to know that there is a lot they can do to protect their patients' PHI and prevent data breaches. This guide breaks down and explains the most important and often challenging pieces of that puzzle."

"The SecurityMetrics HIPAA Guide is one of the best helps . . . it's well organized and easy to understand for our medical office staff and providers," said Hedy Haun, Sr. Process Analyst at Sharp HealthCare Organizations.

Individuals who would like a copy of the SecurityMetrics 2020 Guide to HIPAA Compliance can download a PDF copy for free. Download the 2020 Guide to HIPAA Compliance here.

To learn more about SecurityMetrics or HIPAA, contact 801-705-5621, email consulting@securitymetrics.com, or visit www.securitymetrics.com/hipaa.
For press inquiries contact 801-995-6516, or email pr@securitymetrics.com.

About SecurityMetrics (www.securitymetrics.com)
SecurityMetrics helps customers close data security and compliance gaps to avoid data breaches. They provide managed data security services and are certified to help customers achieve the highest data security and compliance standards.

As an Approved Scanning Vendor, Qualified Security Assessor, Certified Forensic Investigator, and Managed Security provider, SecurityMetrics guides organizations through data security testing and compliance mandates (HIPAA, HITRUST PCI, GDPR). With over 15 years of forensic investigations, penetration testing, vulnerability assessments, and HIPAA/PCI compliance audits, SecurityMetrics has tested over 1 million systems for vulnerabilities. The privately held company is headquartered in Orem, Utah where it maintains a Security Operations Center (SOC) and 24/7 multilingual technical support.

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SOURCE SecurityMetrics