How Healthcare Organizations Can Deploy Data Security More Holistically To Prevent Third-Party Breaches

The hardest part about securing sensitive healthcare data is continuously knowing where sensitive data resides and who has access to it. This creates data security and compliance challenges – especially when healthcare data is constantly shared and moved between teams and departments. This has become an even bigger problem in the wake of increasing third-party data breaches. According to a recent report, 35% of all third-party breaches affected healthcare organizations in 2023, which is more than any other sector. Hospitals and healthcare companies are typically connected across a broad ecosystem, and an attack on one organization’s system can have a snowball effect; this is exactly what we saw happen with the UnitedHealth/Change Healthcare and Ascension breaches. While necessary, this reliance on a complex network of third-party vendors, including medical supply companies, software providers, and contractors introduces new potential vulnerabilities with each link.