Are your mission-critical data, customer information, and personnel records safe from intrusions from cybercriminals, hackers, and even internal misuse or destruction?

If you’re confident that your data is secure, other companies had the same feeling:

• Target, one of the largest retailers in the U.S. fell victim to a massive cyber attack in 2013, with personal information of 110 million customers and 40 million banking records being compromised. This resulted in long-term damage to the company’s image and a settlement of over 18 million dollars.
• Equifax, the well-known credit company, was attacked over a period of months, discovered in July 2017. Cyber thieves made off with sensitive data of over 143 million customers and 200,000 credit card numbers.

These are only examples of highly public attacks that resulted in considerable fines and settlements. Not to mention, damage to brand image and public perception.

Kaspersky Labs’ study of cybersecurity revealed 758 million malicious cyber attacks and security incidents worldwide in 2018, with one third having their origin in the U.S.

How do you protect your business and information assets from a security incident?

The solution is to have a strategic plan, a commitment to Information Security Risk Management.

What is Information Security Risk Management? A Definition

Information Security Risk Management, or ISRM,  is the process of managing risks affiliated with the use of information technology.

In other words, organizations need to:

• Identify Security risks,  including types of computer security risks.
• Determining business “system owners” of critical assets.
• Assessing enterprise risk tolerance and acceptable risks.
• Develop a cybersecurity incident response plan.

Building Your Risk Management Strategy

Risk Assessment

Your risk profile includes analysis of all information systems and determination of threats to your business:

• Network security risks
• Data & IT security risks
• Existing organizational security controls

A comprehensive IT security assessment includes data risks, analysis of database security issues, the potential for data breaches, network, and physical vulnerabilities.

Risk Treatment

Actions taken to remediate vulnerabilities through multiple approaches:

• Risk acceptance
• Risk avoidance
• Risk management
• Incident management
• Incident response planning

Developing an enterprise solution requires a thorough analysis of security threats to information systems in your business.

Risk assessment and risk treatment are iterative processes that require the commitment of resources in multiple areas of your business: HR, IT, Legal, Public Relations, and more.

Not all risks identified in risk assessment will be resolved in risk treatment. Some will be determined to be acceptable or low-impact risks that do not warrant an immediate treatment plan.

There are multiple stages to be addressed in your information security risk assessment.

6 Stages of a Security Risk Assessment

A useful guideline for adopting a risk management framework is provided by the U.S. Dept. of Commerce National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). This voluntary framework outlines the stages of ISRM programs that may apply to your business.

1. Identify – Data Risk Analysis

This stage is the process of identifying your digital assets that may include a wide variety of information:

Financial information that must be controlled under Sarbanes-OxleyHealthcare records requiring confidentiality through the application of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, HIPAA

Company-confidential information such as product development and trade secrets

Personnel data that could expose employees to cybersecurity risks such as identity theft regulations

For those dealing with credit card transactions, compliance with Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS)

During this stage, you will evaluate not only the risk potential for data loss or theft but also prioritize the steps to be taken to minimize or avoid the risk associated with each type of data.

The result of the Identify stage is to understand your top information security risks and to evaluate any controls you already have in place to mitigate those risks. The analysis in this stage reveals such data security issues as:
Potential threats – physical, environmental, technical, and personnel-related

Controls already in place – secure strong passwords, physical security, use of technology, network access

Data assets that should or must be protected and controlled

This includes categorizing data for security risk management by the level of confidentiality, compliance regulations, financial risk, and acceptable level of risk.

2. Protection – Asset Management

Once you have an awareness of your security risks, you can take steps to safeguard those assets.

This includes a variety of processes, from implementing security policies to installing sophisticated software that provides advanced data risk management capabilities.

• Security awareness training of employees in the proper handling of confidential information.
• Implement access controls so that only those who genuinely need information have access.
• Define security controls required to minimize exposure from security incidents.
• For each identified risk, establish the corresponding business “owner” to obtain buy-in for proposed controls and risk tolerance.
• Create an information security officer position with a centralized focus on data security risk assessment and risk mitigation.

3. Implementation

Your implementation stage includes the adoption of formal policies and data security controls.

These controls will encompass a variety of approaches to data management risks:

• Review of identified security threats and existing controls
• Creation of new controls for threat detection and containment
• Select network security tools for analysis of actual and attempted threats
• Install and implement technology for alerts and capturing unauthorized access

4. Security Control Assessment

Both existing and new security controls adopted by your business should undergo regular scrutiny.

• Validate that alerts are routed to the right resources for immediate action.
• Ensure that as applications are added or updated, there is a continuous data risk analysis.
• Network security measures should be tested regularly for effectiveness. If your organization includes audit functions, have controls been reviewed and approved?
• Have data business owners (stakeholders) been interviewed to ensure risk management solutions are acceptable? Are they appropriate for the associated vulnerability?

5. Information Security System Authorizations

Now that you have a comprehensive view of your critical data, defined the threats, and established controls for your security management process, how do you ensure its effectiveness?

The authorization stage will help you make this determination:

• Are the right individuals notified of on-going threats? Is this done promptly?
• Review the alerts generated by your controls – emails, documents, graphs, etc. Who is tracking response to warnings?

This authorization stage must examine not only who is informed, but what actions are taken, and how quickly. When your data is at risk, the reaction time is essential to minimize data theft or loss.

6. Risk Monitoring

Adopting an information risk management framework is critical to providing a secure environment for your technical assets.

Implementing a sophisticated software-driven system of controls and alert management is an effective part of a risk treatment plan.

Continuous monitoring and analysis are critical. Cyber thieves develop new methods of attacking your network and data warehouses daily. To keep pace with this onslaught of activity, you must revisit your reporting, alerts, and metrics regularly.

Create an Effective Security Risk Management Program

Defeating cybercriminals and halting internal threats is a challenging process. Bringing data integrity and availability to your enterprise risk management is essential to your employees, customers, and shareholders.

Creating your risk management process and take strategic steps to make data security a fundamental part of conducting business.

In summary, best practices include:

• Implement technology solutions to detect and eradicate threats before data is compromised.
• Establish a security office with accountability.
• Ensure compliance with security policies.
• Make data analysis a collaborative effort between IT and business stakeholders.
• Ensure alerts and reporting are meaningful and effectively routed.

Conducting a complete IT security assessment and managing enterprise risk is essential to identify vulnerability issues.

Develop a comprehensive approach to information security.

PhoenixNAP incorporates infrastructure and software solutions to provide our customers with reliable, essential information technology services:

• High-performance, scalable Cloud services
• Dedicated servers and redundant systems
• Complete software solutions for ISRM
• Disaster recovery services including backup and restore functions

Security is our core focus, providing control and protection of your network and critical data.

Contact our professionals today to discuss how our services can be tailored to provide your company with a global security solution.

Imagine your patient data being held hostage by hackers. Security threats in healthcare are a genuine concern.

The U.K.’s healthcare industry recently suffered one of the largest cyber breaches ever.

WannaCry, a fast-moving global ransomware attack shut the NHS systems down for several hours. Healthcare institutions all over the country were unable to access patient records or schedule procedures. Appointments were postponed, and operations got canceled while experts worked to resolve the issue.

Although the attack impacted other companies and industries as well, the poorly defended healthcare system took a more significant hit. It was just one of the incidents that showed the extent to which healthcare institutions are vulnerable to cyber threats. Learn how to be prepared against the latest cybersecurity threats in healthcare.

11 Tips To Prevent Cyber Attacks & Security Breaches in Healthcare

1. Consider threat entry points

An entry point is a generic term for a vulnerability in your system that can be easily penetrated by hackers. By exploiting this vulnerability, hackers can deploy a virus to slow your network, access critical health information, or remove defenses to make your system more accessible in the future.

Malware can be introduced from any vulnerable spot in your network or operating system.

An employee can unknowingly click a file, download unauthorized software, or load a contaminated thumb drive. Also, when strong secure passwords are not used, an easy entry point for hackers is created.

Moreover, medical software and web applications used for storing patient data were found to contain numerous vulnerabilities. Healthcare cybersecurity statistics by Kaspersky Security Bulletin found open access to about 1500 devices that healthcare professionals use to process patient images.

2. Learn about ransomware attacks

A ransomware attack is a specific type of malware which threatens to lock one computer or an entire network unless a certain amount of money is paid.

The ransom is not necessarily an impossibly high figure either. Even demanding a few hundred dollars from a business could still be easy money for a hacker, and more manageable for individuals or companies to come up with to get their computers back.

3. Create a ransomware policy

One disabled computer does not necessarily bring much damage. However, the risk of not being able to access larger sectors where electronic records reside could be disruptive, even dangerous to patient treatment.

When such an incident happens, employees must immediately contact someone on their healthcare IT team. This should be part of their security training and overall security awareness. They must follow healthcare organization procedures when they see a ransomware message, instead of trying to resolve the matter themselves.

Authorities warn against paying ransomware culprits since there’s no guarantee a key will be given. Criminals may also re-target companies that paid them in the past.

Many companies solve ransomware attacks by calling the police and then wiping the affected computer and restoring it to a previous state.

Cloud data backups can make it easy to restore systems in the events of an attack. Disaster recovery planning should be done before a cyber security threat occurs.

Employee Roles in Security in Healthcare

4. Focus on Employee Security training

Cybersecurity professionals employ robust firewalls and other defenses, but the human factor remains a weak link as was displayed in the WannaCry exploit.

To minimize human error, system admins need to remind all staff about risky behavior continually. This can include anything from downloading unauthorized software and creating weak passwords to visiting malicious websites or using infected devices.

Educate employees on how to recognize legitimate and suspicious emails, threats, and sites so they can avoid phishing attacks. (Unusual colors in logos or different vocabulary are both warning signs). Training should be refreshed regularly or customized for different employee groups.

5. Create or expand security Measure risk levels

Different employee groups should be provided with varying privileges of network access.

At a hospital, nurses may need to share info with other staff in their unit, but there’s no reason for other departments to see this. Visiting doctors may receive access to only their patient’s info. Security settings should monitor for unauthorized access or access attempts at every level.

Chris Leffel from Digital Guardian suggests training/education first, followed by restricting specific apps, areas and patient healthcare data. He also recommends requiring multi-factor authentication, which is an additional layer of protection.

6. Healthcare Industry Cybersecurity Should Go beyond employee access

Patient concerns about sensitive data security and IT in healthcare should be kept in mind when creating safer, stronger systems, or improving cybersecurity frameworks after a hospital was hacked.

Patients are often already nervous and don’t want to worry about data security. Likewise, system administrators should also make sure that threat intelligence funding remains a priority, which means continuing to invest in security initiatives.

Publicizing you have taken extra steps in your patient security efforts will drive more security-conscious patients your way. Patients care.

7. Protect Health Data on ‘smart’ equipment

Desktops, laptops, mobile phones, and all medical devices, especially those connected to networks, should be monitored and have anti-virus protection, firewalls, or related defenses.

Today’s medical centers also possess other connected electronic equipment such as medical devices like IV pumps or insulin monitors that remotely sync patient information directly to a doctor’s tablet or a nurse’s station. Many of these interconnected devices could potentially be hacked, disrupted, or disabled, which could dramatically impact patient care.

8. Consider cloud migration For Your Data

The cloud offers a secure and flexible solution for healthcare data storage and backup. It also provides a possibility to scale resources on-demand, which can bring significant improvements in the way healthcare organizations manage their data.

Cloud-based backup and disaster recovery solutions ensure that patient records remain available even in case of a breach or downtime. Combined with the option to control access to data, these solutions can provide the needed level of security.

With the cloud, a healthcare organization does not have to invest a lot in critical infrastructure for data storage. HIPAA Compliant Cloud Storage allows for significant IT cost cuts, as no hardware investments are needed. It also brings about a new level of flexibility as an institution’s data storage needs change.

9. Ensure vendors Are Compliant

The Healthcare Industry Cybersecurity Task Force, established by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and Department of Homeland Security, warned providers of areas of vulnerability in the supply chain. One of their requirements is for vendors to take proper steps to monitor and detect threats, as well as to limit access to their systems.

Insurance companies, infrastructure providers, and any other healthcare business partners must have spotless security records to be able to protect medical information. This is especially important for organizations that outsource IT personnel from third-party vendors.

10. How HIPAA Compliance can help

Larger healthcare organizations have at least one person dedicated to ensuring HIPAA compliance. Their primary role is creating and enforcing security protocols, as well as developing a comprehensive privacy policy that follows HIPAA recommendations.

Educating employees on HIPAA regulations can contribute to creating a security culture. It also helps to assemble specific HIPAA teams, which can also share suggestions on how to restrict healthcare data or further cyber defenses in the organization.

HIPAA compliance is an essential standard to follow when handling healthcare data or working with healthcare institutions. Its impact on the overall improvement of medical data safety is significant, and this is why everyone in healthcare should be aware of it.

11. Push a top-down Security Program

Every medical facility likely has a security staff and an IT team, but they rarely overlap. Adding healthcare cybersecurity duties at a managerial level, even as an executive position, can bring multiple benefits.

It can make sure correct initiatives are created, launched, and enforced, as well as that funding for security initiatives is available. With cybersecurity threats, being proactive is the key to ensuring safety long term. Regular risk assessments should be part of any healthcare provider’s threat management program.

Healthcare: $3.62 Million Per Breach

Cybersecurity in the healthcare industry is under attack. Cybersecurity threats keep hospital IT teams up at night, especially since attacks on medical providers are expected to increase in 2018.

The latest trends in cybersecurity might be related to the fact that healthcare institutions are moving towards easier sharing of electronic records. That and a potentially nice payoff for patient information or financial records make healthcare a hot target for hackers.

For medical centers themselves, hacks can be costly. The average data breach costs a company $3.62 Million. This includes stolen funds, days spent investigating and repairing, as well as paying any fines or ransoms. Attacks can also result in a loss of records and patient information, let alone long-lasting damage to the institution’s reputation.

As much as hospitals and medical centers try to protect patient privacy, security vulnerabilities come from all sides. A great way to keep up with the latest security threats is to attend a data security conference.

Healthcare organizations want to send patient info to colleagues for quick consultations. Technicians pull and store sensitive data easily from electronic equipment. Patients email or text their doctor directly without going through receptionists, while admins often send a patient record to insurance companies or pharmacies.

So the industry finds itself in a dangerous position of trying to use more digital tools to improve the patient experience while following a legal requirement to safeguard privacy. No wonder IT teams continuously wonder which hospital will be hacked next.

The truth is that healthcare institutions are under a significant threat. Those looking to improve security should start with the steps outlined below.

In Closing, The Healthcare Industry Will Continue to Be Vulnerable

Healthcare facilities are often poorly equipped to defend their network activities and medical records security. However, being proactive and aware of ever-changing cybersecurity risks can help change the setting for the better.

Of course, education alone won’t help much without battle-ready infrastructure. With the assistance of healthcare industry cybersecurity experts like phoenixNAP, your healthcare organization can ensure security on multiple levels.

From backup and disaster recovery solutions to assistance creating or expanding a secure presence, our service portfolio is built for maximum security.

Do not let a disaster like WannaCry happen to your company. Start building your risk management program today.

We have created a free HIPPA Compliance Checklist.

Many technology professional initially think of bare metal recovery as a tool for emergencies only.

A disaster that impacts your network can take any number of forms. A flood, storm or fire could wipe out your data center or systems; hackers could hold your network for ransom or a malicious insider could let cybercriminals in. In the end, it does not matter if you had a careless employee or faced the wrath of Mother Nature — the result is a catastrophic failure of your network and the total interruption of your organization’s ability to do business.

A backup recovery strategy is paramount. Most incidents allow for recovery.

Simple turn things over to an IT team or even a virtual program and wait for the restoration of your systems. But for those cases where you are unaware of the extent of damage or that destroy your systems beyond repair, bare metal disaster recovery may be needed.

What is Bare Metal Backup?

With traditional bare metal recovery methods, you move information from one physical machine to another.

Enterprise systems allow you to try a variety of bare metal backup combinations.

This can include moving a physical machine to a virtual server; a virtual server to a physical machine; or a virtual machine to another virtual server.

Some methods require converting your original system’s physical image into a virtual image. Utility tools for this include dd in Linux; ddr in IBM VM//370; WBadmin in Windows Server 2008; and Recovery Environment in Windows.

You can also use your original machine information to create multiple identical virtual or physical machines.

These can be useful if you’ve made an optimal machine or a server configuration you like. Backups of your original machine can be handy if you ever need more versions. For instance, you may want to increase space in a server volume.

Your virtual servers will be able to come online quickly from the backup. This is a better option than taking a long time to create something new from scratch each time.

Likewise, if one of your virtual servers appears to be crashing, you can make a quick identical copy.

What is Bare Metal Restore or Recovery?

Bare metal recovery or bare metal restoration is a type of disaster recovery planning for your network.

This is used after a catastrophic failure, breach or emergency; the “bare metal” part of the term refers to starting almost from scratch. When an IT expert performs this task, they are working from the very beginning and recovering, reinstalling and rebuilding your system from the ground (or bare metal) up.

This approach means starting with clean, working hardware and reinstalling operating systems and other software; this way you know your network is being restored on a new, error-free base without any lingering risk or problems.

Begin bare metal restore by saving an image of your existing machine or server onto an ISO file or placing it onto a thumb drive or a network server. Then load the image or file onto your ‘blank’ machine.

The term ‘bare metal’ describes how the second machine contains just a hard drive, a motherboard, processor and a few drivers.

If you perform the formatting correctly, you’ll be able to bring back your settings and data quickly. This can be done in a few hours, faster than a full rebuild. Re-installing all applications and drivers could take days.

A lot could go wrong if recovery takes place incorrectly. If the motherboards, processors or BIOS differ even slightly, the new machine may not boot. Data loss, corrupt or general data failure all could take place.

Newer tools improve the odds of data being adequately restored. Individual drivers can modify system settings on the second machine’s CPU. This can make sure an adequate boot-up occurs even if the hardware is different.

Bare metal restore is recommended as a smart disaster recovery method. Loading data onto a new machine takes place quickly. This can be useful for critical situations such as hardware failure or cyber attacks.

While this is a restore of last resort (no one wants to have to do it), it does provide you with peace of mind about the process and your network’s integrity.

If your disaster was a breach, managing security risk is an essential part of recovery resume your normal functions with confidence.

Benefits of Bare Metal Restoration

Bare metal restoration can be useful for emergencies, virtual environments and hybrid cloud/dedicated systems.

At the same time, a BMR shouldn’t be thought of as a continuous server backup.

Most standard system backup tools allow users to designate which items should be saved. This often includes documents, folders and application data, not the applications themselves. Creating a full backup also may allow you to choose when and how often it takes place.

Another type of backup is a system state, which allows you to recover your operating system files even with a lost registry.

A restoration, on the other hand, copies over an entire drive, including applications. It can be compared to a one-time snapshot of your machine or server at a specific time.

Bare metal restoration is similar to Windows System Restore. This tool restarts your system from a previous save point. A BMR does the same task but does so from within a different machine.

A bare metal restoration can also include a system state backup and disaster recovery.

Data Backup vs. Data Recovery

Bare metal recovery can go beyond emergencies or multiple virtual machines. It can also enhance cloud architecture, improve security and conserve resources. Another use has been found for bare metal recovery. It can be a way to create multiple copies along with backups of virtual machines easily.

You can also create a bare metal dedicated server. This can be useful for companies that use cloud services but have traffic spikes during peak times. For instance, a game server could demand varying cloud storage space and bandwidth throughout the day. These types of situations often require higher costs.

Off-loading data to a bare metal dedicated server instead of the cloud can offer:

• More customization. A dedicated server makes it easy to customize server settings instead of the standard options from a shared cloud.
• Higher performance. Bare metal servers remain separate from shared cloud resources, so there’s less processing demand or lag and no type 1 or 2 hypervisor required.
• Stronger security. A bare metal dedicated server stays private from other shared cloud backup services. The ‘single tenant’ won’t need to co-exist with other cloud businesses, so may be ideal for storing sensitive information.
• Cost Savings. Lower demand, bandwidth, and traffic can mean IT cost savings.

Need to perform a Bare Metal Backup Recovery?

If you have suffered a catastrophic failure and all other recovery measures have failed, it is likely time to consider bare metal recovery. In some cases, your internal team or external data recovery experts may be called in to review the incident and determine the extent of the damage.

Once other measures have been exhausted, bare metal disaster recovery is the final option. How swiftly you decide to proceed with this option will depend on:

• The extent of the damage to your systems
• Type of damage
• Overall possibility of recovery
• How long it takes to troubleshoot or try other, less intensive methods first

What to Expect with During Restoration

Once other avenues have been exhausted and your team makes the decision to go with this form of data recovery, your network will be rebuilt from the ground up:

• Physical location repair: If your emergency was weather-related, fire-related or otherwise resulted in physical damage. Then the first step for any recovery will be restoring and rebuilding the physical setting. Structural work, waterproofing, and HVAC work may be required to ensure that the space is not only safe for your team but that your servers, workstations and other pieces will operate at peak efficiency. This is also the time to add in any additional physical security or measures to prevent attacks in the future.
• New Hardware: This is the “bare metal” referred to in the name of this recovery process. You’ll add new, clean and bare hardware to your server area; by starting from the metal up, you can be sure your pieces are untainted and ready to use. Once these are installed, you’ll be able to recover and rebuild your system.
• Operating Systems: Your operating systems will be added to the hardware to create an optimal environment for the platforms, programs and processes your business relies on.
• Application Installation: The apps you use to run your business will be added to your system. The fresh application ensures that you are working with pristine equipment and creating a new network that won’t be affected by the recent emergency.
• Clean Data Restoration: Backup data that is unaffected by whatever happened to mess up your network in the first place can be added in at this time. Whether you have disks, cloud recovery or another backup, it can be restored into your new system.
• Add Users: Adding back in your team and allowing them to access your restored system is the next step. Ideally, you’ll have clarified your password requirements and ensure that any BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) programs are secure as well.
• Plan for next time: If you already have bare metal disaster recovery software in place, this process is far more simple. Once you have been through a recovery of this nature, it is a good idea to think ahead to next time. What process, material, backup or functionality would have made it easier for you to recover your data? Is there a solution that would complete the task more quickly, allowing you to resolve the issue without a lot of downtime rapidly? Learning from this experience can help you be better prepared for the future and ensure that you don’t have to worry about what comes next.

Why Disaster Recovery?

Every business needs a data recovery plan.

According to the United States Department of Homeland Security, every business that has or relies on a network should have an IT disaster plan.

A whopping 60% of small to mid-sized businesses close forever after a successful breach or failing to a prevent ransomware attack. They can’t afford the downtime and recovery process. Being prepared for any eventuality as part of a business continuity plan can help ensure that your organization avoids this fate.

The need to be prepared has grown in recent years. Criminals have gotten more sophisticated as organizations have begun relying on technology more than ever. The increased reliance on technology coupled with an ongoing and steady increase in risk means that any business with a network needs to be fully prepared for an emergency. This includes preparing for the worst case scenario with bare metal disaster recovery capabilities.

Planning Ahead With Bare Metal Backup and Recovery

Take steps now with server backup to ensure you can recover data later.

Just being aware that threats exist and the extensive damage they can cause is a step in the right direction. Understanding how bare metal disaster recovery differs from general recovery and what is needed for the process allows you to incorporate this into your emergency and business continuity planning.

You have a wide range of options to choose from when it comes to a bare metal disaster recovery system. Select one before you need it. This is the key to a swift and efficient recovery.

If you already have a disaster plan in place and have backed up data, the process will be fast, easy and effective.

If you have to learn about the recovery process after the fact, you’ll face a more complex and less user-friendly process. The resulting delays can have a significant impact on your business. Taking steps now to protect your network can save time, money and headache later.

You’ll be ready for anything, even if the worst happens.