By using this site, you agree to the Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.
Accept
Health Works CollectiveHealth Works CollectiveHealth Works Collective
  • Health
    • Mental Health
    Health
    Healthcare organizations are operating on slimmer profit margins than ever. One report in August showed that they are even lower than the beginning of the…
    Show More
    Top News
    bowl of vegetable salad
    Raw Foods: benefits and harms
    November 9, 2021
    pros and cons of the keto diet
    Read This Before You Follow the Keto Diet
    May 18, 2022
    spinal cord injuries
    4 Potential Causes of Spinal Cord Injuries (and How to Seek Compensation)
    May 25, 2022
    Latest News
    7 Most Common Healthcare Accreditation Programs: Which Should You Use?
    August 20, 2025
    Hospital Pest Control and the Fight Against Superbugs
    August 20, 2025
    Hygiene Beyond The Clinic: Attention To Overlooked Non-Clinical Spaces
    August 13, 2025
    5 Steps to a Promising Career as a Healthcare Administrator
    August 3, 2025
  • Policy and Law
    • Global Healthcare
    • Medical Ethics
    Policy and Law
    Get the latest updates about Insurance policies and Laws in the Healthcare industry for different geographical locations.
    Show More
    Top News
    TBI: Some Surprising Statistics
    February 9, 2016
    Your Keys to Safer, Even More Secure Healthcare Cloud Services
    January 13, 2015
    4 Career Options in Healthcare Industry that Combine Big Data & Healthcare
    February 5, 2021
    Latest News
    How Social Security Disability Shapes Access to Care and Everyday Health
    August 22, 2025
    How a DUI Lawyer Can Help When Your Future Health Feels Uncertain
    August 22, 2025
    How One Fall Can Lead to a Long Road of Medical Complications
    August 22, 2025
    How IT and Marketing Teams Can Collaborate to Protect Patient Trust
    July 17, 2025
  • Medical Innovations
  • News
  • Wellness
  • Tech
Search
© 2023 HealthWorks Collective. All Rights Reserved.
Reading: Healthcare Data Breaches: What Are the Risks?
Share
Notification Show More
Font ResizerAa
Health Works CollectiveHealth Works Collective
Font ResizerAa
Search
Follow US
  • About
  • Contact
  • Privacy
© 2023 HealthWorks Collective. All Rights Reserved.
Health Works Collective > Policy & Law > Global Healthcare > Healthcare Data Breaches: What Are the Risks?
Global HealthcareNewsPolicy & LawTechnology

Healthcare Data Breaches: What Are the Risks?

Annie Qureshi
Annie Qureshi
Share
6 Min Read
healthcare data breach
SHARE

Healthcare is private and highly sensitive. When an individual’s health history or current treatments are exposed through a healthcare data breach, it’s one of the most violating types of data breaches one can encounter. Healthcare breaches give hackers access to information that can help them steal identities and continue on data theft quests.

Contents
  • How Healthcare Breaches Happen
  • How Healthcare Systems Are Protecting Patients
  • Can You Sue If You’re a Victim of a Healthcare Breach?

Unfortunately, healthcare data breaches are all too common. One in four Americans has been a victim of a healthcare breach at some point. Despite federal protection from the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA), there are still healthcare breaches all the time.

In 2014, one of the largest health data systems breach ever recorded occurred to Community Health Systems, when 4.5 million patient records were exposed, resulting in a class action lawsuit with Pittman, Dutton & Hellums Law Firm. In 2017, nearly 700,000 records were exposed in a breach against the Commonwealth Health Corporation. While cybersecurity measures are becoming more sophisticated, so are hacker methods. Here’s what to be aware of.

How Healthcare Breaches Happen

Just like any cybersecurity attacks, there are many common factors that contribute to the risk of healthcare breaches. These include:

More Read

Screen Shot 2014-04-15 at 7.27.04 AM
The Aesthetics and Reconstructive Surgery Products Global Market
The Cookie-Cutter Medicine Fallacy
5 Tips to Help Prevent Alzheimer’s Disease
BioPharma Beat: mHealth Apps – to Regulate or Not to Regulate
Envisioning Medical Technology and the Future of Healthcare
  • Outdated systems: Healthcare organizations are ones with some of the most complex data on-hand, and often this data is stored in extremely outdated systems. Because the systems can be expensive to update or migrate over to systems with better protection, some are never changed or not changed until a breach has occurred. Using old and ineffective security measures makes them vulnerable to attacks.
  • Poor testing: A lack of penetration and vulnerability tests makes an un-proactive security approach one that is not as effective as one featuring regular testing.
  • Assuming there is no risk: Thinking that HIPPA standards offer enough protection does not safeguard healthcare entities or their patients. For example, encryption is not mandatory under HIPPA, but it can be a valuable factor in protecting customer data.

A lack of automation also negatively affects healthcare security. In this vulnerable industry, unfortunately older systems and manual processes contribute to the high risk of healthcare breaches.

How Healthcare Systems Are Protecting Patients

Healthcare data breaches are expensive, not just for patients who have to work to recover their data, but for the organizations that are victims of them. HealthITSecurity reports the average cost of a healthcare records is twice the global average cost, at $380 per stolen healthcare record in 2017, compared to the global average of $141. Measures healthcare providers are implementing to protect patients include:

  • Incident response plans, so organizations can quickly identify, shut down and mitigate the damage of breaches
  • Use of cloud-based systems, which are relatively new in healthcare but provide critical backup of healthcare records in the case of a breach, as well as the use of backup generators for healthcare systems compromise and power failure
  • Data encryption, which follows National Institute of Standards and Technology standards for encryption processes for data at rest and data in motion
  • Employee training, for proper use of, access of and protection of patient data
  • Data loss protection, including permission-based file sharing and testing of security architecture

Additionally, healthcare employee equipment that has patient data on it or that is used to access patient data, such as laptops, must be protected. Employees who work remotely must use security protocol when accessing information.

Can You Sue If You’re a Victim of a Healthcare Breach?

Healthcare providers bear much of the responsibility when a breach happens. Prevention through proper security measures is paramount, because victims of healthcare breaches are in fact able to sue the healthcare provider after a breach. In August 2017, the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C., ruled that health insurance company customers can sue a provider after a data breach. The ruling brings about the anticipation of increased future class action lawsuits due to data breaches in healthcare.

If you are the victim of a data breach, you should receive a letter detailing the breach and what information of yours was exposed. It’s vital to change passwords and alert credit-reporting bureaus that your information has been compromised. You also might consider signing up for identity theft protection. Sometimes, the healthcare company will offer those whose information was breached free protection, which you can take advantage of.

If you are concerned that your stolen information has now led to your identity being stolen, you should file an identity theft report with the Federal Trade Commission. Here, you can also contact the Federal Trade Commission to report privacy concerns.

You may also want to contact a lawyer, who may be able to file a lawsuit on your behalf or help you become part of a class action lawsuit concerning the breach. As a patient in a healthcare system, your information and privacy should never be compromised. When it is, becoming a party in a lawsuit can help to ensure it doesn’t happen again in the future and help you secure the compensation you deserve.

TAGGED:healthcare data breach
Share This Article
Facebook Copy Link Print
Share

Stay Connected

1.5kFollowersLike
4.5kFollowersFollow
2.8kFollowersPin
136kSubscribersSubscribe

Latest News

engineer fitting prosthetic arm
How Social Security Disability Shapes Access to Care and Everyday Health
Health care
August 20, 2025
a woman explaining the document
How a DUI Lawyer Can Help When Your Future Health Feels Uncertain
Public Health
August 20, 2025
physiotherapist at work
How One Fall Can Lead to a Long Road of Medical Complications
Health care
August 20, 2025
Common Healthcare Accreditation Programs
7 Most Common Healthcare Accreditation Programs: Which Should You Use?
Health News
August 20, 2025

You Might also Like

Jon Huntsman Could Help the HealthCare Debate

January 4, 2012
emergency room
BusinessHospital AdministrationPublic Health

Are Emergency Rooms Admitting Too Many Patients?

May 28, 2014

Global Size and Growth of Spine Surgery Market Segments

July 7, 2011
AI in pharmaceutical industry
Pharmaceuticals

Automation in Pharmacovigilance: A Double-Edged Sword

November 15, 2023
Subscribe
Subscribe to our newsletter to get our newest articles instantly!
Follow US
© 2008-2025 HealthWorks Collective. All Rights Reserved.
  • About
  • Contact
  • Privacy
Welcome Back!

Sign in to your account

Username or Email Address
Password

Lost your password?