Bulk of Calif. breaches could be prevented with encryption
Seventy percent of breaches involving the California healthcare industry were due to unencrypted data on lost or stolen hardware or portable media, a problem that strong encryption would fix, according to the latest data breach report from the state's attorney general. Only 19 percent of such breaches occurred in other industries.
However, healthcare's 25 breaches accounted for 15 percent of the total reported in California in 2012 and 2013 affecting 1.5 million records (6 percent) while the retail industry had 43 breaches that exposed 15.4 million records (84 percent).
Healthcare was the only sector in which malware and hacking was not a significant cause of the reported breaches, accounting for just 9 percent, compared with 88 percent of the total in retail.
More than half the healthcare breaches (55 percent) included Social Security numbers, which can be abused in many ways, the report points out.
The state has been trying to make encryption mandatory for personal data in transit.
Access the complete report.
Editor Beth earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism and master’s in health communication. She has worked in hospital, academic and publishing settings over the past 20 years. Beth joined TriMed in 2005, as editor of CMIO and Clinical Innovation + Technology. When not covering all things related to health IT, she spends time with her husband and three children.