IBM: Healthcare most susceptible to inside jobs targeting e-records

Newswire: March 29, 2017.

Dateline: Armonk, N.Y.

The healthcare industry in 2016 saw, by a wide margin, a greater percentage of malicious insider attacks compromising electronic records than any other sector, according to a report from IBM.

The analysis, contained in IBM’s annual Threat Intelligence Index for 2017, found that 25 percent of attacks on healthcare IT last year were carried out by “malicious insiders.” That figure dwarfs the 5 percent of inside jobs carried out on the financial services sector, which came in second place.

Similarly, the 29 percent of outsider-based attacks on the healthcare field were the lowest of the top five industries surveyed (which included information and communications, manufacturing, and retail).

Analysts believe the data points out the increasing fear among healthcare IT professionals that their electronic records are less secure than any other major field, and that the healthcare industry does not do much to secure these records beyond minimum compliance standards. This is of particular concern as medical records command black market prices much higher than those for credit card or personal information stolen from the retail or communication sectors.

The website Health Data Management’s top 10 list of data breaches in the U.S. healthcare industry compromised the records of more than 12.5 million individuals.

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