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Healthcare leaders are recognizing the potential of cyberattacks on their organizations' daily operations. Combatting these attacks and potential breaches of clinical and patient data requires in-depth analysis to determine strategies to make healthcare organizations' IT security stronger. Doing so requires everyone, from IT teams to medical leadership to business leaders, to acknowledge and accept the responsibility for cybersecurity and work together to develop as well as execute the needed protocols.
The onus does not fall solely on the chief information security officer or chief information officer, but on everyone in the organization's leadership. This means physicians, clinicians, medical technicians, nurses and staff.
Here are four sound strategies healthcare leaders must employ to make their IT security stronger.
Train Employees on Information Security and Phishing Awareness and Other Cyberattacks
Cybersecurity and phishing awareness training should be for everyone in the healthcare organization. Since many successful cyberattacks begin with email, and everyone in the organization uses email, security awareness training must evolve to counter such attacks. For email, multifactor authentication is required for protection, particularly for those viewing patient data from a remote location.
Given the new landscape that features working remotely, cybersecurity strategies must include securing data for doctors, nurses, administrators and others who are either working at home or in a clinical setting within the organization. Everyone must be taught security protocols to protect their personal devices and home networks.
Mobile devices — smartphones, tablets and laptops — must have immediate updates and patches applied to guard against targeted threats. Patient information must be secure, protected and accessible for authorized personnel while preventing unauthorized individuals from gaining access and misusing devices. Medical personnel and employees should have access to automated IT security controls, such as endpoint device security tools that support and protect operating systems and software on mobile devices to ensure patches are immediate and suspicious behaviors are flagged instantly. In addition, access should always be conditional and within the policy set by management to ensure both device and end-user security in light of ever-evolving cybersecurity threats.
Develop Incident Response and Disaster Recovery Plans
Healthcare leaders must have incident response and recovery plans in place with a crisis response team to manage cybersecurity in the event of a data breach or cyberattack. A holistic security strategy accounts not only for the threat response but also has workflows in place to protect and recover data. Identifying potential threats with behavior-based logic and recognition of suspect behavior can help prevent or mitigate damages should a breach occur. The issue is that automation can only do so much. The system must be monitored and provide centralized reporting to the proper personnel who can address issues effectively.
Incident response is a documented procedure identifying team members' roles and responsibilities when an incident occurs. They will contain damage, communicate internally and externally, restore systems back to normal and investigate to identify the root cause as well as the extent of the damage. In addition, the document also identifies the training and administering of tabletop exercises. A disaster recovery plan is a documented process listing all business-critical applications/systems, the backup and recovery process of those systems, their recovery time objective (the time it takes to recover the system in case of its failure) and the recovery point objective (the maximum amount of time that organization can tolerate losing data), team members, periodic backup validation and the annual disaster recovery plan exercise.
Having both types of plans available and updated on a timely basis will avoid last-minute scrambling when a security incident occurs. These plans must be tested on an annual basis through tabletop exercises with a simulated event to make sure everyone understands their roles, responsibilities, actions to be taken and decisions to be made.
Invest in Cybersecurity Software/Tools
Every innovation brings the need for new security requirements as digital technologies are connected to improve healthcare for patients. Digital transformation continues to evolve with better care opportunities while also introducing and increasing security threats. As new, improved models in healthcare evolve — clinics, surgery centers, in-home care — attack surfaces also broaden, opening doors for hackers who are financially motivated. The good news is cybersecurity tools and software can help thwart the efforts of those hoping to steal personally identifiable data and protected health information, carry out ransomware attacks or control medical devices.
A zero trust security framework offers a high level of protection, securing data across applications and environments for users and devices regardless of location. The deployment of malware protection and endpoint protection offers additional security, while automating IT security tasks also promises to reduce threats. Regular risk assessments, testing and intelligence tools also play an important role in making IT security stronger in healthcare organizations.
Continuously Assess Current and Potential Security Risks
Mitigating risks begins with a deep understanding by all leadership of processes and operations to plan and manage current and potential security threats. Tabletop exercises can play a vital role in identifying weaknesses and developing effective responses to data breaches. It is crucial that all key parties participate in team meetings and tabletop exercises to ensure accurate assessment and planning of effective, enforceable security protocols. Considering all factors for a healthcare organization's cybersecurity can only make it stronger and keep systems secure.