The New Year is a great time for hospitals and health systems to reassess and improve their information technology and data security practices. In doing so, organizations need to be award of IT security trends in 2013.
According to Coalfire, an independent IT compliance firm, 2013 will hold the following for IT:
1. The migration to mobile computing will accelerate, and the features of mobile operating systems will be viewed as vulnerabilities. As of today, there is no way to secure an unsecured mobile operating system, according to Coalfire. Some risks can be mitigated, but much vulnerability remains. This lack of mobile device and mobile network security will drive protection to the data level.
2. Governments will lead the way in the enterprise migration to secure cloud computing. The payback for adopting shared applications in shared hosting facilities with shared services will be too compelling to delay any longer, especially with ever-increasing pressure to reduce spending, according to Coalfire.
3. Lawyers have found a new revenue source — suing negligent companies over data breaches. According to Coalfire, it will no longer be acceptable to obtain an IT audit or assessment from the same company that is managing an organization's security programs. The risk of being found negligent or legally liable in any area of digital security will drive the need for independent assessment.
4. Security technology will start to streamline compliance management. Continuous monitoring and reporting systems will be deployed to collect compliance evidence more efficiently, and auditors will be able to complete an assessment more thoroughly with reduced time on site and less time organizing evidence to validate controls.
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According to Coalfire, an independent IT compliance firm, 2013 will hold the following for IT:
1. The migration to mobile computing will accelerate, and the features of mobile operating systems will be viewed as vulnerabilities. As of today, there is no way to secure an unsecured mobile operating system, according to Coalfire. Some risks can be mitigated, but much vulnerability remains. This lack of mobile device and mobile network security will drive protection to the data level.
2. Governments will lead the way in the enterprise migration to secure cloud computing. The payback for adopting shared applications in shared hosting facilities with shared services will be too compelling to delay any longer, especially with ever-increasing pressure to reduce spending, according to Coalfire.
3. Lawyers have found a new revenue source — suing negligent companies over data breaches. According to Coalfire, it will no longer be acceptable to obtain an IT audit or assessment from the same company that is managing an organization's security programs. The risk of being found negligent or legally liable in any area of digital security will drive the need for independent assessment.
4. Security technology will start to streamline compliance management. Continuous monitoring and reporting systems will be deployed to collect compliance evidence more efficiently, and auditors will be able to complete an assessment more thoroughly with reduced time on site and less time organizing evidence to validate controls.
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