A recent report from the International Data Corporation (IDC) claims that in 2016, one in three U.S. health care customers will have their health records breached. The increasing number of breaches in the health care industry is said to be related to a combination of weak cybersecurity and electronic patient records. Some of these records include very personal information such as credit and Social Security numbers in addition to personal medical histories, allowing (which allows) a criminal to receive free health coverage or prescription medication that can be re-sold on the black market.
The FBI predicts that health care fraud costs between $74 billion and $247 billion annually. Lynne Dunbrack, vice president for IDC’s Health Insights group, explains why we are seeing this increasing number of data breaches in the health care industry: “Frankly, health care data is really valuable from a cyber criminal standpoint … It could be five, 10 or even 50 times more valuable than other forms of data.”