Mobile Technology Causing Healthcare Data Breaches?

Report suggests portable devices often to blame

Monday, April 16, 2012

The use of new technologies to store and transport data might actually be leading to more data breaches as a result of employees misplacing data or falling victim to security vulnerabilities.

The HIMSS Analytics Report entitled Security of Patient Data found that mobile devices in exam rooms and administrative areas increase the risk of data breaches either through accidents or attacks of some kind, according to a report from PC World. In all, 27 percent of all healthcare facilities have had at least one data breach in the last year, up from 19 percent in 2010, and 79 percent of those incidents were attributed to employees' actions.

And since 2010, the threat of breaches caused by mobile devices has doubled, the report said. Now, breaches where the source of data loss was a laptop or handheld device accounted for 22 percent of all incidents, up from 11 percent in 2010.

Ondrej Krehel, chief information security officer for Identity Theft 911, has a blog about the dangers caused by data breaches and what organizations and consumers alike can do to mitigate those concerns.

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