When large tech companies talk about cybersecurity, compliance and risk management, it usually sounds like something for the big players. That is, large enterprise operations or businesses that would be the target of major attacks. The truth is, however, that our data-driven economy levels the playing field in many ways. One of these ways, unfortunately, is by making small businesses just as vulnerably to cyber attacks as their larger counterparts. 

According to IBM, 2021 saw the highest average costs for breaches. On average, data breaches costs businesses in the United States up to $4.24M. While that doesn’t mean that your breach could cost you that much, it’s important to know that, no matter the size of your business, you need to take cybersecurity seriously.

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The Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification (CMMC) framework is a relatively new yet still partially implemented set of cybersecurity regulations targeting DoD agencies and contractors. The DoD specifically built the rules to address the IT infrastructure and security practices needed to handle Federal Contract Information (FCI) and Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI). After a lengthy review, the DoD has, as of November 2021, released an updated version of CMMC, known colloquially as CMMC 2.0.

What is CMMC 2.0? We’ll cover some of the more significant changes here, what this means for DoD contractors, and how you can prepare for the change.

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Healthcare data and privacy have been a priority for lawmakers and IT professionals for decades. Maintaining privacy related to health information, and giving ownership and agency over disclosure to patients, drives current regulations around Personal Health Information (PHI). The most important of these regulations, HIPAA, has undergone various changes and revisions over time to meet modern security demands. One of these changes, the implementation of HITECH and digital record keeping, includes several additional rules on managing digital health records, including the concept of “meaningful use.”

Here, we will discuss what it means when HITECH legal language encourages the meaningful use of health records and how that can impact compliance and security. 

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