Keep it Simple: When it comes to the business of health, we probably don't know everything. "Data Breaches Up Almost 50 Percent" screams the headline in this article in the washingtonpost.com(This message refers to an article reported by Brian Krebs in the washingtonpost.com on January 6, 2009: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/05/AR2009010503046.html).
As President elect Obama takes office and works to fulfill his promises regarding health care reform, we hope he too is open to things he doesn't know. The health insurance industry is pushing for more technological records whether it's the reward of 2% increase in fees for physicians who go online regarding prescriptions or the encouragement of individuals to "protect" their health and increase their convenience by putting their personal health records online (no promise of money savings).
Among the many pitfalls of technology is the ever-present "identity theft." Identity theft is treated harshly when it's your run of the mill guy stealing credit cards but when it comes to corporations who lose data to the tune of millions of individuals, neither the reporting of such data breaches nor the penalties for such breaches have kept pace with the huge push for legislation mandating the use of online personal records of various sorts.
Keep it simple today and read the article in the washingtonpost.com and review whether your convenience is worth the risk and how you will respond to mandates supported by health insurance companies and government that more and more of your information go online with insufficient protections in the form of monitoring after data breaches and damages covering your potential risks from having your information out there.
As you read through the article note: "Nearly 42% of organizations that disclosed a data breach or loss last year did not divulge the number of consumer records that might have been jeopardized."
Ask your representatives and your insurers HOW they handle security breaches and what financial damages are available in the event of a data breach from the willful acts of or negligence by their employees. Further, we seek strict liability, where it is unnecessary to prove actual damages but where the event itself is presumed to do us harm.
