Hospitals and other providers need health data security tools to help reduce risks as well as prevent attacks and breaches of data. Such security leaks can harm organizations financially and legally. But to help address the new threats regularly faced by healthcare groups successfully, companies need to consider upgrading their cybersecurity tools to better protect themselves against newer and more sophisticated attacks on healthcare data security involving phishing, spoofing, ransomware and identity theft.
The first step towards successful safety in healthcare is to select the right set of products to address the specific security gaps that an organization may have. IT departments should compare different tools based on these eight key areas as part of the purchasing process.
System Vulnerability Checks
Another area in which health IT can certainly benefit is the assessment of vulnerability. With a typical hospital’s high number of applications and servers, IT can find it very challenging to keep up with which systems are safe and have experienced attacks. There are certainly third-party applications that are available for download, such as Nmap, Nessus, Network Vulnerability Assessment and many others. Additional vendors also offer evaluation tools and protection tools such as Cisco, IBM, FireEye Inc. and Symantec.
Network Monitoring Services and Proactive Alerts
During business hours, cyberattacks do not always strike. With email phishing, network device attacks and duplicate websites, cybercriminals attempt attacks around the clock. For this reason, even when IT is unavailable, an effective cybersecurity platform should provide warnings and 24/7 monitoring. IBM Managed Detection and Response Services, IBM Security Intelligence and Consulting Services, Trend Micro Enterprise Support Services, and FireEye Managed Defense are some of the products that deliver these services.
Anomaly Detection and Automatic Protections
In the past, IT admins would simply lock user accounts as the primary means of protection after a number of failed login attempts. But as the number of attacks increases, health IT needs data security tools that go further in preventing future attacks. Some of the options include Cisco and SonicWall firewalls that can block IP addresses when hacking attacks are detected by the system. Other tools such as Microsoft Advanced Threat Protection and Cisco Duo can enforce multi-factor authentication when detecting abnormalities in the user’s access or attempted system access.
Cybersecurity remains a top priority for healthcare groups throughout. While healthcare organizations have several options to choose from, care must be taken to select the right system so that they have the necessary protection in the productivity of the worker and system without interruptions. This means that investing time to compare the various options is a worthwhile effort to ensure that all of their very critical data security and compliance needs are addressed by the platform they choose.
