Healthcare leaders shift strategy from prevention to cyber resilience


 For years, the main goal of hospital cybersecurity was simply to stop hackers from getting in. However, the massive cyberattack on Change Healthcare has forced the industry to accept a hard truth: total prevention is impossible. Security leaders are now shifting their focus to "cyber resilience." This means accepting that attacks will eventually happen and planning specifically for how to keep the hospital running while under siege. The goal is no longer just building higher walls, but ensuring the hospital can survive the breach.

This new strategy prioritizes "downtime procedures"—the manual backups and paper-based plans that staff use when computers go dark. In the Change Healthcare incident, organizations that practiced these emergency plans recovered much faster than those that relied solely on digital defenses. Leaders are urging hospitals to rigorously test their backup systems, ensuring they aren't just theories in a binder. By treating a cyberattack like a natural disaster, healthcare providers can ensure that patient care continues safely, even when the technology fails.

Read the original article at: https://healthsystemcio.com/2024/05/14/change-from-change-how-solid-cybersecurity-practices-can-prevent-catastrophic-attacks/

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