We've written before about our sharp and industrious intern Jessica Wilson, who hacks medical devices to learn then better and who has contributed to many parts of BlueFlow, most recently our Active Directory integration.
Topics: RECRUITING, Healthcare Cybersecurity, Penetration Testing
Safety first: cybersecurity of assets on clinical networks
It's been an amazingly busy year for medical device security. In 2015, the average hospital had not heard of ransomware. (We warned of the hospital malware onslaught in 2012!) In 2016, the hospital C-suites began asking us, "Could that happen here??" after neighboring health systems were taken offline for days by malware. Duh, yes. The important question is how will you ensure that hospital operations continue to remain available to deliver patient care despite legacy capital equipment, cybersecurity risks, and the shifting threat landscape.
Topics: Healthcare Cybersecurity, Ransomware, Medical Device Security, Legacy Medical Devices, Asset Management, Enterprise Risk Management, Inventory Management, Clinical Security, CMMS
Pacemaker Programmers (Rogue Ones): Detecting MICS Band Intruders with Software Radio
The healthcare world is abuzz about potential vulnerabilities in cardiac implants. It seems that every few months, hackers publish yet another attack paper. We know the hospital C-suites are concerned about it, because protecting health delivery organizations is our business. The good news is that there are cost-effective ways for healthcare delivery organizations to manage many of the cybersecurity risks against implantable medical devices.
Topics: Healthcare Cybersecurity, Medical Device Security, Internet of Things / IoT
This blog post is about the long awaited fact sheet from HHS Office of Civil Rights (OCR) on ransomware, and why you should take this one seriously in terms of having an accurate inventory of networked medical devices to reduce the probability of enjoying the pleasure of reporting a breach to OCR.
Topics: Healthcare Cybersecurity, Ransomware, Medical Device Security, Legacy Medical Devices, Asset Management, Enterprise Risk Management, Inventory Management, Clinical Security, CMMS
Ransomware is just the tip of the iceberg.
As we roll out BlueFlow™, we wanted to take some time to share two quick graphics with you that we've used to help us frame our conversations with healthcare delivery organizations (HDOs).
Topics: Healthcare Cybersecurity, Ransomware, Medical Device Security, Breaches, Network Assets, Enterprise Security, Network Security, Network Scanning, Inventory Discovery, Vulnerability Management, Downtime
FDA Postmarket Cybersecurity Guidance Respects Clinical Workflow
Last week, the Food and Drug Adminstration (FDA) closed the public comment period on the draft guidelines for Postmarket Management of Cybersecurity in Medical Devices.
Topics: FDA, Healthcare Cybersecurity, Ransomware, Medical Device Security, Clinical Security, Clinical Information Systems, Medical Device ePHI
Virta Labs Receives $750K Grant for Healthcare Security
Ann Arbor, MI, March 25, 2016 — Healthcare security company Virta Laboratories, Inc. received a $750K grant from the NSF Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program. Virta Labs provides solutions for hospitals and medical device manufacturers to measure and visualize exposure to cybersecurity risks without interrupting clinical workflow. The company plans to use the federal grant to extend its product lines into healthcare delivery organizations that face serious cybersecurity challenges. Virta Labs received a Phase I grant from the same program in 2015.
Topics: Healthcare Cybersecurity, NSF SBIR, Medical Device Security, Healthcare IoT, Clinical Engineering, Connected Medical Devices
I asked our (now famous) intern Jessica to share a sampling of some of the "crazier" things she's seen during her time at Virta. Read on for a selection of her findings while poking around on some medical devices.
Topics: RECRUITING, Healthcare Cybersecurity, Medical Device Security, Healthcare IoT, COTS, Connected Medical Devices
FDA's Draft Guidance: The Long and the Short Of It
People have been asking us all week for our opinions on the FDA's new postmarket cybersecurity draft guidance. All three of Virta Labs' founders have been active in this area, with extensive research in applied security and longstanding support for collaborative efforts:
- raising the flag on potential issues in 2008;
- demonstrating the first attacks on a medical implant;
- signal-injection attacks in the analog domain;
- building novel nonintrusive defenses;
- organizing a series of successful workshops to bring together stakeholders for constructive discussions;
- conducting meta-analysis of postmarket security monitoring; and
- educating the National Academy of Engineering and numerous government bodies about the risks and rewards of medical device security
We read the draft guidance so that you could tl;dr and get back to your own job. Here are the highlights, as we see them.
Topics: FDA, Healthcare Cybersecurity, Medical Device Security, Clinical Engineering, Healthcare IT, Clinical Information Security
In our last post, we brought you some information about internships at Virta Labs and our recruiting process.
Topics: RECRUITING, Healthcare Cybersecurity, Medical Device Security, Legacy Medical Devices