NOTE: As discussed here previously, Online Tech was part of a panel webinar presentation of “5 Key Tools to Help Your Organization Achieve HIPAA Compliance,” inspired by a BlogHipaa.com post that cited tips from representatives of organizations specializing in each of those five areas. The following infographic, created by the Compliancy Group, is compiled from information compiled during that Oct. 21 webinar.

By JASON YAEGER Online Tech Director of Product Management, Risk Management Officer and Security Officer The cost of data loss can be staggering. A study at the University of Texas tells us that 43 percent of companies that experience a catastrophic data loss never reopen, and that another 51 percent close the doors within 10 years. For small- and medium-sized businesses, the cost is even more staggering: 70 percent of companies with fewer than 100 employees that experience a catastrophic …

Want to learn more about five tools that can help protect patient data? Online Tech Director of Healthcare IT April Sage will be part of a panel presenting “5 Key Tools to Help Your Organization Achieve HIPAA Compliance” via webinar on Tuesday, Oct. 21. The 90 minute webinar begins at 2 p.m. ET. (Register here.) BlogHipaa.com presented the five tools in a recent post, citing tips from representatives of organizations in each area. Now those industry experts will co-present a …

In regulated industries, sensitive data must both be protected and retained, a challenging juxtaposition in a landscape of increasing cybersecurity threats. In the healthcare field, for example, losing data is one matter. Not having “exact retrievable copies,” as required by law, is another. And protecting those backed up files is equally important. Healthcare and financial data must be retained for several years, but in many cases companies that handle sensitive data may retain it much longer. This means exponentially more …

For many in the Midwest, fall is hunting season, and it wouldn’t be official without an outhouse reference. “Bear” with me; many companies are choosing the outhouse option needlessly as a regular course of their offsite backup and recovery planning. As everyone plans and budgets for next year, many organizations are re-evaluating if their resources are best spent on managing offsite backup and recovery in-house, or if using a third party can effectively allow them to concentrate resources closer to …

As HIPAA regulations increase and cybersecurity threats advance, the healthcare industry’s effort to protect patient data gets more complex. Online Tech recently contributed to a story posted on BlogHIPAA.com that covers five tools to help protect patient information and ease the compliance burden: Email encryption Mobile phone BYOD protection HIPAA-compliant storage HIPAA-compliant hosting Compliance tracking solution BlogHIPAA spoke with representatives from industry-leading organizations in each of these areas, each of them focused on compliance. They each provided insight into why …

It’s official! Our newest data center in Indianapolis is open for business. We’re very excited to bring secure, compliant, enterprise class cloud, colocation and offsite backup and disaster recovery to Indianapolis. It’s a great pleasure to have the opportunity to serve Indiana businesses and its IT community from the 44,000 square foot facility on Merrill Street, minutes from downtown, that officially opened today. So what makes Online Tech unique in the Indianapolis market? Just like at our four other Midwest …

The American Health Information Management Association (AHIMA) is holding its 86th annual convention and exhibit in San Diego this week. This year’s theme is “Leading the Way to Health Intelligence” and its schedule of events is designed to address the challenges and opportunities healthcare professionals face now and in the future. Cloud computing presents many of those challenges and opportunities, so Online Tech has gotten in on the fun. At 8 a.m. Wednesday, Online Tech Director of Healthcare IT April …

In a previous post, I laid out the first three questions your CIO should answer before you start your backup and recovery research. The CIO should provide direction around the value of the data, the Recovery Point Objective (RPO) and the Recovery Time Objective (RTO). Once these executive-level business requirements are understood, the context can be used to ask the next set of high-level business and technical questions that drive your backup and recovery strategy. 1) How confidential or compliant …

We attempt to stay on top of cyber security and data breach topics here on the Online Tech blog, providing some industry perspective to news of large data breaches like those at Community Health Systems, P.F. Changs, eBay, Target and other unnamed victims. Of course, we don’t cover them all. We’d be writing nothing else. You’d be reading nothing else. Consider that along with reports today about Home Depot investigating a potential breach of customer credit card numbers, over the …