Health care organizations must strictly comply with the Health insurance portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) Privacy and Security rules that require organizations to have proper security controls for handling personal information referred to as “protected health information,” or PHI. This includes security controls for the IT infrastructure handling PHI. List THREE risks, threats, and vulnerabilities that can violate HIPAA privacy and security requirements?

Answer:

There are several possible vulnerabilities, threats, and risks associated with the Health insurance portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) that can violate its regulations. They are as follows.

Possible vulnerabilities that can violate HIPAA privacy and security requirements.

• Storing protected healthcare information (PHI) without any encryption methods in a system is a violation of HIPAA regulation
• Lack of an essential authentication method for securing the PHI from unauthorized access is a HIPAA violation.
• Lack of exploiting appropriate access control methods to define the privileges of employees that can access the PHI.

Possible threats that can violate HIPAA privacy and security requirements.

• Hacking PHI is a threat for healthcare organizations so proper establishment of antivirus software and firewalls to improve security is essential. If this is not well maintained it is a violation of HIPPA.
• Employee threat is another HIPAA violation where an unauthorized employee tries to access the PHI for malicious or any other purpose.
• Unauthorized sharing of PHI is another security threat where PHI is released to a third party or any unauthorized personals is a HIPAA violation.

Possible risks that can violate HIPAA privacy and security requirements.

• Loss or theft of infrastructure related to healthcare information such as storage device of PHI or system that contains PHI is a HIPAA violation.
• Lack of performing risk analysis to identify the potential threats and vulnerabilities is a HIPAA violation.
• Risk regarding the improper management of security vulnerability and threats is a HIPAA violation as well.