Key Cybersecurity Defenses for the Healthcare Sector

The following is a guest article by Sam Manjarres, Sr. Product Marketing Manager, Identity Security at WatchGuard
The healthcare industry is increasingly in the crosshairs of cybercriminals. In 2022, as cyberattacks globally rose by 38% year-on-year, healthcare became the third-most-attacked industry (behind government and education), recording an increase of 74% and reporting up to 1,463 incidents per week. Unsurprisingly, a recent Gartner Peer Insights survey – Cybersecurity in the Healthcare Industry – also showed that nearly half of participating healthcare organizations have experienced a data breach in the past two years. As the number of connected and unmanaged healthcare devices increases, threats targeting Internet of Things (IoT), Internet of Medical Things (IoMT), and Operational Technology (OT) devices can undermine the confidence of patients in the ability of healthcare organizations – and the industry as a whole – to deliver high-quality care while protecting their safety.
What is most concerning about attacks on healthcare organizations is that any of the four most common types of attacks (ransomware, supply chain attacks, cloud or business email compromise) can trigger serious consequences for the health of patients, even putting their lives at risk. Yet, despite the stakes, many healthcare organizations aren’t as well-protected as they could be. For instance, only 24% of healthcare organizations have multi-factor authentication (MFA) policie...

Source: EMR and HIPAA - October 4, 2023 Category: Information Technology Authors: Guest Author Tags: Ambulatory C-Suite Leadership Health IT Company Healthcare IT Hospital - Health System IT Infrastructure and Dev Ops LTPAC Security and Privacy Advanced Persistent Threat APT Cyberattacks Cybersecurity Data Breaches Healthcare Ph Source Type: blogs