Does HIPAA require penetration testing services?

Healthcare organizations are accountable for safeguarding a sizable amount of protected information in addition to enhancing patient quality of life.

Because medical records contain a lot of individually identifying information, hackers are drawn to them (Social Security numbers, insurance information, payment processing details, etc.). As a result, healthcare organizations need to defend their networks and systems in order to comply with HIPAA and safeguard digitally protected health information (ePHI).

This entails preserving a secure network, protecting cardholder data, addressing vulnerabilities, putting in place effective access control measures, and routinely testing and monitoring networks.

Here, HIPPA penetration testing is relevant. HIPAA penetration tests help find flaws before attackers can take use of them. The following ways that this kind of review benefits the healthcare organization:

• Identifying any environmental issues that may be present.
• Determining the organization’s level of risk exposure.
• Aiding in the detection and fixing of faults.

As a company, you want to safeguard sensitive data from online criminals, and penetration testing is necessary for this. However, let’s go back to the beginning.

What exactly does a HIPAA penetration test involve?

On August 21, 1996, the Healthcare Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, or HIPAA as it is more commonly known, was passed as a program to modernize medical records. The vast majority of medical records were retained on paper up until the mid-1990s.

Prior to the creation of HIPAA, there were no federal standards controlling the sharing or safeguarding of private health information. When HIPAA penetration testing was created, there were enormous external pressures exerted on every industry, including the healthcare sector.

Legislators and healthcare professionals recognized the need for patient data to be protected while still being accessible to patients as the world became more data-driven and the rate of change in the healthcare industry surpassed that of the rest of the world. Authorities and healthcare professionals agreed that in the future, health records will need to be digitized and kept in an electronic format.

The HIPAA framework is under the control of the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). To create regulations that safeguard healthcare organizations, their partner organizations, and their customers, the HHS works with governmental organizations and cybersecurity specialists.

Penetration testing is a method that assesses the robustness of these requirements, making it a crucial part of HIPAA compliance even though it is not required by HIPAA.

HIPAA penetration testing: Is it necessary?

Penetration testing is not expressly mandated by HIPAA standards. Nonetheless, in compliance with the regulations, covered organizations must undergo a security risk assessment.

Covered entities must identify risks and vulnerabilities in their environments as part of the risk analysis mandated by the HIPAA Security Regulation and put security measures in place to reduce those risks and vulnerabilities. Access controls, audit controls, integrity controls, authentication controls, and transmission security measures all need to be in place in healthcare organizations.

As previously stated, Covered Entities are required to use continuous monitoring and technical assessment methods in accordance with the administrative safeguard evaluation standard. This technique, known as HIPAA penetration testing service, is employed to evaluate the efficacy of security precautions.

During pen testing, HIPAA-covered businesses must identify and assess the risks related to their systems through risk analysis. You must put security measures in place in accordance with the HIPAA Security Rule to prevent unauthorized access to, use of, disclosure of, alteration of, or destruction of electronically protected health information (ePHI).

To make sure your security systems are effective and compliant with HIPAA regulations, use penetration testing.

Criteria for HIPAA Compliance Penetration Testing

Understanding a few basic concepts is necessary in order to grasp what compliance is and to whom it applies.

Hospitals, doctors, medical institutions, insurance providers, and other firms that frequently deal with patients’ private information are referred to as Covered Entities.

Service providers who collaborate closely with Covered Entities but do not deal directly with patients are known as business associates. Due to their technology, consultancy, financial management, data analysis, or other services, business partners frequently handle private data.

The management and preservation of ePHI is addressed in all privacy, security, and reporting standards.

Now that we’ve reviewed the principles, let’s look at the regulations that establish the framework and significance of everything related to compliance requirements:

Privacy Regulation under HIPAA

Patients’ rights to privacy and personal information are made the national standard by the HIPAA Privacy Regulation. Additionally, it establishes guidelines for what constitutes ePHI, how data must be safeguarded, what uses are permitted and prohibited, and how it should be communicated and maintained.

The documents and exemptions that businesses administering ePHI are required to furnish are another aspect of the Privacy Regulation.

Any identifiable patient data is subject to privacy protection by the covered entity or any related businesses in accordance with the definition of ePHI under this regulation. The following is an illustration of “protected health information”:

• Any information pertaining to past, present, or foreseeable medical or mental conditions.
• Any records relating to the patient’s treatment.
• Any documents that refer to previous, ongoing, or upcoming payments for healthcare.

The rule provides that covered companies may only exchange private health information under very limited care, research, or legal conditions. These restrictions are extremely narrow in and of themselves and open to legal interpretation. It is the Covered Entity’s and its Business Affiliates’ duty to protect ePHI’s confidentiality.

Security Regulation under HIPAA

The next step is to protect that data after privacy and ePHI have been specified. The national requirements for the defenses necessary to protect ePHI data were set by the HIPAA Security Regulation.

All aspects of the covered entity’s operations, including technology, management, physical security precautions for computers and other equipment, and anything else that might have an impact on ePHI security, are covered by these safeguards.

Three types of safeguards comprise the controls in this rule:

• Administrative: This covers all ePHI-related regulations and procedures, as well as the technology, risk management, and maintenance plans for all other security measures. The administrative facets of healthcare also include human resources and staff development.
• Access to physical equipment, including computers, routers, switches, and data storage, is protected by physical security measures. The secure locations that Covered Organizations maintain must only allow authorized people access to data.
• Technically speaking, the term “cybersecurity” refers to the actual technology for storing and transporting ePHI, including computers, mobile devices, encryption, network security, device security, and everything else.

The HIPAA Omnibus Rule

With the recently enacted Omnibus rule, businesses other than Covered Entities are now covered by the regulations.

Contractors and business affiliates must essentially abide by the Omnibus Rule. As a result, Covered Entities must update their gap analyses, risk assessments, and compliance procedures to take into account potential violations by Business Affiliates and contractors.

Conclusion

Assuring compliance with diverse regulatory frameworks requires penetration testing. By identifying and evaluating the risks related to your systems, you can make sure that your security measures are sufficient and adhere to the specific requirements of each framework.

Auditor-friendly documentation of due diligence is another benefit of penetration testing. When it comes to compliance, it is always crucial to work with a professional penetration testing company that focuses on fulfilling compliance requirements.