Reduce Stress at Work and Improve Performance
Studies show that as little as 10 minutes of exercise during your workday can help you de-stress, re-focus, and even boost your brainpower. It might be a vigorous lunchtime walk – or even a quick game of ping-pong (like we do at HIPAA Vault). Whatever it may be, physical activity helps to reduce stress, releases... Continue reading
Will your Company be Impacted by GDPR?
Four years after its adoption by the European Parliament, the General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) – a set of compliance requirements designed to give individuals greater control over their personal data in an increasingly digital economy- finally went into effect on May 25, 2018. GDPR’s overall scope is broad, impacting all personal data (ie, any... Continue reading
What’s all the Hype about Kubernetes?
What is Kubernetes, or K8s? Kubernetes, or “K8s” as it’s popularly known, comes from a Greek word meaning “pilot,” or “helmsman.” Based on the original, internal Google code used to run their search ads and apps (and geekily named after the Star Trek: Voyager Borg drone known as ‘Seven of Nine’), it purports to warp... Continue reading
Public Cloud Hosting vs Private – HIPAA Secure Hosting
The numbers are in … More and more, companies are migrating to the public cloud. In fact, a recent survey predicts 83% of enterprise workloads will be in the cloud by 2020. Of those, 49% are utilizing the Google Cloud Platform (GCP). (Interestingly, the hybrid cloud is also becoming part of the conversation for the tech giant, but that’s... Continue reading
Phishing in the Wrong Pond
Have you heard the one about the company that decided to plan a “Phishing trip” for their employees? Back in 2016, Atlantic Health System circulated a juicy email, promising employees a raise if they would simply respond with some key verification information. The information included employee id, date of birth, and home zip code. Roughly... Continue reading
Is Gmail HIPAA Compliant?
Still one of the most popular online searches in regard to HIPAA, the answer is clear: as a standalone service, Gmail by itself is not HIPAA compliant, but it can be. Even though Google employs some of the best security measures available, sending electronically protected health information (ePHI) using a regular Gmail account is explicitly prohibited... Continue reading
Hurricanes and HIPAA
HIPAA Disclosures in Emergencies In September of 2018, the powerful tropical storm known as Florence slammed into the eastern seaboard, causing catastrophic flooding and leaving 53 deaths in its wake. With a peak wind intensity of 140 mph, the long-lasting storm became the wettest tropical cyclone recorded in the Carolinas, dumping as much as 36... Continue reading
Physical Safeguards for HIPAA, Part 2: Workstation Use
In part 1 of this series, we learned that a laptop containing sensitive, protected health information (PHI) was stolen from the car of a West Virginia Health System employee. To make matters worse, the hard drive containing PHI was unencrypted, leaving the data open to access by unauthorized users. While unfortunate, the occurrence does serve to highlight... Continue reading