NNews-Spring-2022

25 practitioners being compromised. Beyond giving foothold and access to all privileged information to unauthorized third parties, the threat of having compromised commu- nications channels will have a detrimental effect on clients’ privacy. Impact on Productivity – Many are familiar with the word “ransom- ware”; but from our experience, few under- stand the meaning or impact of ransom- ware. Imagine waking up one morning, sitting at your desk and your computer is locked. You can’t access it, but you are not the only one, so are all your colleagues in the firm. The outcome? Everything is put on hold, the clinic is forced to freeze its opera- tions (think billable hours) while trying to remedy the issue. If you or your firm invested proactively in cyber defense, you might be able to resume operations in a day, two, or three. Less cyber-ready firms, unfortunately, spend weeks operating at a loss of 70%-80% from normal productivity levels and then struggling for weeks, if not months, trying to recover. The threat of cyber for healthcare providers is real and, according to the data, imminent. Cyber attackers constantly evolv- ing the ways they are able to penetrate orga- nizations and cause damages. It is important not to treat cyber risk as an “IT problem”, but rather as a business risk that can result in serious and even ongoing concern problems, as we have detailed above. Healthcare pro- viders are in an elevated risk environment since they draw attention to both their own finances and records and also their clients’ accounts. We have seen cases in the past where breaches of clinics were just collateral damage and the true targets were actually specific clients or subsequent extortion of the entire clientele lists. How Protected Are You? If you cannot easily answer this question, then it is time to assess your cybersecurity posture in order to protect your business, and you should speak with a cybersecurity expert who can give you an immediate ac- tionable recommendation on how to elevate your cybersecurity posture. NJAMHAA Tech- nology Council member Armour Cybersecu- rity offers free security assessments. Call Jeff Zeiger at 856-308-8698 for a quote today! Healthcare Providers Are Prime Targets