Healthcare Industry Poised to Break Into Clouds
The health care industry has faced some specific barriers to full adoption of cloud computing. A primary barrier is the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability act, or HIPAA.
Every health care professional knows the implications of HIPAA, which not only required the establishment of electronic health records (EHRs) but also mandated stringent regulations on data privacy.
In effect, the law mandated a huge expansion in health care computing needs (by requiring EHRs), while at the same time blocking an easy path to meeting those needs in the public cloud (by threatening heavy fines for privacy violations).
Most institutions were simply not willing to trust data security to the public cloud. Even with encryption and other barriers, data breaches and security failures remain all too common. And, if a breach occurs, it’s the health care provider – not the cloud provider – who’s on the HIPAA hook. Continue Reading…