Prevent Insider Access Goof-Ups in Healthcare!

Corporate insiders could be initiators of security breaches – dormant or active! Knowingly or unknowingly they might push out information that is meant to be kept locked-up and protected inside IT systems.This is not to suggest that you must not trust your people. However it is important to set the checks in place. Many healthcare organizations are still not waking up to the reality. They are yet to understand the impact of such a fraud being conducted by trusted insiders, which can dent the reputation of the business.
While some healthcare facilities may have assessed the situation entailing data vulnerabilities and take proactive initiative to remove employees from the network after they exit, doing this might not be enough. Insider fraud is not just conducted by employees, but could involve contractors, vendors, and business partners as well – basically anyone who has authorized access to the system. Thus, adding extra layers of security through privileged access management have become all the more critical to prevent malicious insiders accessing sensitive medical data, protected by HIPAA/HITECH regulations.

Access management policies adhere to IT security management for safeguarding essential data. Further, programs and structures are also required for filtering and designing the correlation rules for supporting the detection of any unwanted and unauthorized access.

All said, now healthcare establishments have to consider following while placing access management algorithm:

• Processing of user access rights

  It creates a schedule for processing the requests for adding, revoking, or changing the access rights to a particular indigenous network of an organization. Further, it ensures the authorization of the user rights to the person in charge.

• Maintaining catalog with user profiles and user roles

  This ensures the prevention of unwanted accumulation of access rights that are being granted to the users. Continuous and adaptive evaluation, along with updating the system catalog of user-profiles, helps in offering suitable access as per user roles.

• Engaging with information security management

  It enables in adhering to the provisions of the information security policy. The core of information security management is controlling access to data or applications. The same applies to dealing with requests from the users for accessibility options. The mentioned process involves the creation of the username and password controls, accompanied by the inclusion of the necessary creation of roles and groups with properly defined access privileges. In addition to the rights granting, access management systems particularly revoke the rights when a user’s status changes due to various circumstances, such as resignation, transfer or termination, change in third-party vendors, etc.

• Creating a stringent de-provisioning protocol for outgoing employees

  An important factor that intentionally or unintentionally promotes chances of insider data theft is when an employee leaves an organization. Such an employee is tempted to transfer the information to the next employer. A perfect counter-action against such probable circumstances is immediate termination of all the accounts and access. The organization should also make sure that the employee returns all the access tokens to the authorized department. Further, the employees should be reminded of the legal responsibilities and the norms of confidentiality.

Mitigating such threats is not as challenging as it has been made out to be, with the right set of controls and various security measures such threats can be minimized. Further, organizations are often not aware that they are victims of insider fraud as it gets difficult to delineate between authorized access and malicious ones. While the cost of insider frauds could reach millions, there are far-reaching consequences such as losing consumers and reputation in the market. That’s where identity management tools such as privilege account management for the super users, installation and propagation of the authorization, authentication and auditing controls, lifecycle management and provisioning, the connection of platforms with Identity Management platforms, and mobile-based governance, could be opted for to minimize instances of insider fraud. Even for cloud-based applications – not under IAM infrastructure, access is left open when an employee leaves. IdM system protecting the cloud is also required.