How to get started with HIPAA

Runecast Academy Series 2 – Part 7. How to get started with HIPAA

HIPAA, or the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, is a US legislation that requires the creation of certain standards to protect sensitive patient health information. In order to implement these standards, The US Department of Health and Human Services issued the HIPAA Privacy and Security Rule. 

The Privacy Rule is a set of standards that ensure the protection of patient health information while that information is used to have high-quality healthcare. It enables an individual to not only control, but also understand their health information. It permits important uses of information while protecting the privacy of people who seek care and healing. On the other hand, the HIPAA Security Rule requires the protection of a patients' electronically stored information, by following necessary administrative, physical and technical guidelines to ensure the confidentiality, integrity and security of this information.

All organizations that deal with protected health information (PHI) must be HIPAA Compliant. The penalties for HIPAA non-compliance are based on the level of negligence and damage. It can range from $100 to $50,000 per violation, up to a maximum penalty of $1.5 million per calendar year for violations. In addition to this,  certain violations can also result in jail time for the responsible individuals.

Challenges to HIPAA Compliance

Time-Consuming

Each security standard requires a lot of time to be implemented. This is also the case with HIPAA. Implementing a certain security standard into your environment requires long hours of manual work in analyzing and remediating according to the guidelines it contains. This is laborious work for IT teams who not only need to implement a certain security standard and prepare for frequent audits, but also have to carry out a lot of daily tasks.  

Lack of IT Resources

Dealing with the implementation of a single security standard requires the involvement of a lot of people. Not all companies will have enough IT staff to cover every security-related work manually and also deal with everyday tasks.  As a result, staying on top of a security standard becomes challenging due to lack of IT staff. 

Different  IT Environments

As most companies nowadays work in multi-cloud or hybrid-cloud environments, managing all the security issues and complying with all the security standards in a complex environment is challenging. So, getting and staying compliant with every standard one’s organization is taxing to everyone involved. 

Runecast

Real-time Security Analysis and Reports 

Runecast has committed itself to finding a solution to long hours of manual work. In a mission to save you time and other resources, we designed Runecast. Now it is easy to stay on top of your security compliance and all the other security issues. 

Runecast is a platform dedicated to finding the most efficient solution for your organization. It scans your specific configurations, generates automatic remediation scripts and prepares reports in real time. Also, you can filter and sort issues and compare historical configurations at your convenience. Furthermore, it offers a wide range of solutions related to security hardening guidelines, vendor best practices, vulnerability management, configuration drift management etc. Runecast automates your vulnerability management and security standards compliance audits for AWS, Azure, Kubernetes and VMware, as well as for Windows and Linux OS.

Runecast proactively assists with Kubernetes Security Posture Management (KSPM), Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM), and Governance, Risk Management and Compliance (GRC). It provides continuous audits against other common security standards such as CIS Benchmarks, NIST, PCI DSS, DISA STIG, BSI IT-Grundschutz, ISO 27001, GDPR, Cyber Essentials (UK), Essential 8 (Australia). 

Summary

Compliance with HIPAA is mandatory for all organizations that deal with patient  health information (PHI). As many organizations struggle staying on top of security standard’s compliance, Runecast was designed to save your time and resources and make your job stress-free, by providing you with an automated solution that will remove all your manual work.  Also, it offers security hardening guidelines, vendor best-practices, vulnerability management, configuration drift management, to keep your systems running smoothly.