Safeguard your confidential data by implementing HIPAA Privacy Rule’s De-Identification Standard

A legislative act passed in year 1996, called HIPAA or in other words the Health Insurance Portability & Accountability Act affected the health care administration. For years, we have researched upon the safety rule along with three types of security safeguards based mainly on technical and physical grounds.

Amongst the above mentioned three safety points, we delved at the administrative safeguards and its obligatory as well as addressable implementation specifications. In this article, we will examine the main key factors pertaining to the technical and physical safeguards of the security rule. The motive of this article is to simplify and state the main concepts of HIPAA Privacy Rule’s De-Identification Standard.

Physical Safeguards

Physical safeguard rule laid by the HIPAA Privacy Rule’s De-Identification Standarddeals with the strategies and procedures required to be implemented in order to control physical admission to systems or devices containing health information and facilities covering electronic records.

It is therefore mandatory to take maximum care when beginning and removing hardware and software that deals with secured Health Information (PHI) from the network. Utmost care must be taken in disposing off any equipment which is on the edge of retirement, so that PHI contained within such systems is not compromised.

Health data stored in the equipment must be controlled and monitored carefully.Access to the hardware and software must be operated by proper trained and authenticated individuals.Make sure that workstations must be situated away from high traffic areas to avoid direct view of the monitor screens to the public.The main person taking the services of contractors and agents must assure that the contractors and agents are professionally trained and are aware of their duties and responsibilities.

Technical Safeguards

Technical security measures deals with factors that require to be executed when transmitting health information electronically over open networks in order to ensure that health information do not go into wrong hands.

Responsible entity must follow a strict procedure to make sure information integrity which includes digital signature, check sum, message confirmation.Execute right methods to confirm that the entity entitle to access the electronic records is the one it claims to be. There are some signs to confirm the same that includes card systems, password systems, giving a return call, and hand showing signsDrafting and maintaining all policies implemented and practices followed for HIPAA Privacy Rule’s De-Identification Standard that needs to be presented as and when required by the compliance auditors.

Implementation Specifications

We cannot ignore with the healthcare compliance, as it becomes essential to safeguard Protected Health Information.

It is required to employ a system that will take utmost care of the health information, for this our heath care providers like doctors, hospitals and health plans must be given a unique identifier. At present most of them are using either tax-id numbers or employer identification number.

The security and privacy rules have laid down certain provisions to assure that the personal records of people is not misused, secured and kept confidential, any person failing to follow the rule will be fined up to $250,000 and possible jail time for severe enough violations by HIPAA. HIPAA rule was indeed designed and created to ease the massive process of health care administration.

emPower is a leading provider of comprehensive Healthcare Compliance Solutions through Learning Management System (LMS). Its mission is to provide innovative security solutions to enable compliance with applicable laws and regulations and maximize business performance. empower provides range of courses to manage compliance required by regulatory bodies such as O.SHA, HIPAA, Joint commission and Red Flag Rule etc. Apart from this emPower also offers custom demos and tutorials for your website, business process management and software implementation.

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Popularity of drones raising privacy concerns

Drones were once expensive weapons used only by the Department of Defense but now, they've become relatively inexpensive toys and their rise in popularity brings concerns about privacy.

Defense department videos depict what many people probably envision when they think of drones, grainy images from unmanned aircraft taking on enemy stronghold in a war zone, but drones have come a long way.

Andreas Oesterer and Mark Harrison are among the estimated 26,000 drone enthusiasts around the world flying their own robotic aircrafts. "It was not too difficult to get started," Harrison says. Under U.S. law, hobby drones can fly below 400 feet and cannot fly out of sight of the controller. You don't need a permit to fly one and no commercial uses have been approved.

The three to six foot-long machines are relatively affordable because of inexpensive chips, sensors, and cameras that have flooded the market in recent years. "Even a couple of years ago, this would be like a $10,000, $20,000 project and now have it be like $500, $600, as cheap as a smart phone, as cheap as a laptop computer, makes it pretty feasible," Harrison says.

"If you have an iPhone or an Android, you have all the sensors and technology necessary to fly an airplane," Chris Anderson says. Anderson is editor-in-chief of Wired magazine. He started a popular drone website and founded a company that sells drone parts. He says business is growing 50 percent a year. "Right now, the vast majority of people are doing it for fun, education, learning, you know, just the sheer thrill of having a flying robot," he says.

However, it's aerial photography that has many drone pilots most interested. Whether it is being able to wear special glasses to see from the planes point-of-view or just taking in the view of the bay. The Department of Homeland Security operates a small fleet of drones along the Canadian and Mexican borders. "So, with the aircraft, you can put that aircraft up at 400 or 500 feet, be able to scan the area for other individuals and again, contain it more visibly from the air than you could from the ground," explains Vanguard Industries CEO Mike Buscher.

That's raising big concerns about privacy and how the government is using drones to watch all of us. People, when they step outside their door, could end up being tracked 24-7 by these cameras," Trevor Timm with Electronic Frontier Foundation says. He thinks it's getting too easy for government agencies to spy on us with drones. "The FAA was basically mandated to issue drone licenses to public agencies as long as they could prove they could fly them safely," he says.

The foundation sued, demanding to know who has applied for a drone license. They won, so the federal government turned over a list of 60 government agencies who want to use them. On the list were a few dozen law enforcement agencies across the country. "The FAA actually estimates that by 2020 there may be as many as 30,000 drones flying in U.S. skies," Timm says.

Although, drone enthusiasts say they are just doing it for fun. "Hobbyist drones, you can get them up 20, 30 minutes at a time. It's really not practical for long-term surveillance," Harrison says.

(Copyright ©2012 KGO-TV/DT.

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