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Cyber security underpins the safe and secure delivery of digital health services. Modern healthcare critically depends on reliable, effective digital infrastructure, playing a key contribution to productivity and efficiency as well as patient safety.
Nearly a quarter of NHS trusts that responded to an FOI request have no employees with cyber security qualifications, with trusts employing just one qualified security professional per 2,582 employees on average.
Responding to reports that genetics data belonging to some 85,000 individuals had been moved to a secure Ministry of Defence (MoD) base in Wiltshire after multiple hacking attempts, Genomics England said it had ‘no evidence’ that it had been targeted when contacted by Digital Health News.
This month’s round-up of cyber security news nibs includes a cyber-attack on US healthcare provider Atrium Health and a report from the ICO that details how a GP surgery secretary was fired and fined for reading colleagues’ medical records.
According to some local medical committees in England, police are using subject access requests to acquire the medical histories of individuals who have applied for a firearms licence – a mechanism the ICO argues breaches data protection law.
Matt Hancock’s musings on the importance of prevention for the nation’s health have got our expert columnist Davey Winder dreaming of a similar approach to cybersecurity – and pulling out his Star Trek analogies.
Yoshitaka Sakurada was appointed to the cabinet last month, and serves as deputy chief of the government’s cybersecurity strategy office. But when questioned by opposition politicians earlier this week, he admitted he’s never used a computer.
