Security News

Threat Intelligence Supports Advanced Health IT Security

Threat intelligence allows organizations to gather and share health IT security information to better prepare for advanced cybersecurity threats.

Threat intelligence, health IT security

Source: Thinkstock

By Elizabeth O'Dowd

- Health IT infrastructure technology continues to advance as organizations go through digital transformations. More advanced IT tools also means that entities are threated by more advanced cybersecurity attacks. Organizations need to look into threat intelligence solutions to proactively discover network security gaps and prevent cyberattacks before they cause too much damage.

Threat intelligence is evidence-based knowledge that gives organizations insight into emerging and potential threats. This allows them to make informed decisions about how to protect their network from current and possible future threats.

The Ponemon Institute released a report in late 2017 indicating that organizations understand that threat intelligence is critical to modern cybersecurity deployments, but many entities still struggle to leverage the technology because they lack the staff experience needed to handle the amount of data produced and collected.

“It’s abundantly clear that organizations now understand the benefits provided by threat intelligence, but the overwhelming volume of threat data continues to pose a hurdle to truly effective adoption,” Ponemon Institute Chairman and Founder Dr. Larry Ponemon said in a statement.

“Threat intelligence programs are often challenging to implement, but when done right, they are a critical element in an organization’s security program,” he continued. “The significant growth in adoption over the past year is encouraging as it indicates widespread recognition of the value threat intelligence provides.”

Threat intelligence also counts on the support of the community and information sharing among organizations. Information sharing allows organizations to be more successful in identifying threats that can potentially harm the network.

Nearly half of the respondents said their organization participates in threat intelligence sharing communities. However, only 40 percent contribute by sharing their data, while 60 percent only receive community intelligence without contributing their own data.

Despite the continued struggles, threat intelligence is still seen as valuable and necessary for organizations that experience a high volume of cybersecurity threats. Many organizations struggle with how to deploy and manage the technology, but they still see the value in having it as part of their IT infrastructure security.

Building an intelligent cybersecurity system is not an easy undertaking but a necessary one as organizations continue to adopt more advanced technology and ways of sharing data.

New connected medical and mobile devices also add to the complexity of network security

A more proactive approach on top of general threat intelligence can greatly increase network security.

Formal verification is one tool that can be used to improve network security. Formal verification makes sure that network software works the way it’s supposed to.

Verification uses a mathematical system to analyze the design of the network and continuously verifies it as it’s constantly changing.

Network security complexity comes from the many layers of tools such as virtual networks, cloud deployments, and firewalls. These tools need to be integrated and work together to provide one security solution made up of several tools working together, rather than a variety of security solutions working independently.

Security solutions working independently can create holes in the network of which cyberattacks can take advantage.

Using formal verification, organizations can have more confidence in their network security because they have mathematically based confidence in their IT security. Verification goes beyond traditional network monitoring and threat intelligence because organizations don’t need to wait for a weakness in the network to be exposed before defending against it.

Adopting a proactive approach to network security is the only way healthcare organizations can successfully defend against evolving cyberattacks. Network verification is one way entities can have a more active role in their security.