Tag Archive for: Medicine

Cybersecurity in veterinary medicine

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When typical veterinary professionals think about cybersecurity, it is common for them to assume that they are not a target to cyber criminals because of how small their clinic is, all their trust is in a cyber security system, or an IT technician they have on staff. However, according to Clint Latham, JD, director of veterinary data security at Lucca Veterinary Data Security, based in Colorado, they do not care how big or small of a target you are, you are still a target to them.

During his lecture at the American Veterinary Medical Association convention in Denver, Colorado,1 Latham explained to attendees the risks that they face online as veterinary professionals. He also addressed how security errors can happen.

On the rise

When the COVID-19 pandemic shut down the world and forced many veterinary professionals to from home, such as client service representatives, many employees were doing their work through their personal internet service. Latham explained to the attendees that with the increase of working from home, an increase of hackings and cyber-attacks also was happening.

“What we saw was a lot of people working from home, working behind home routers accessing business assets. And hackers knew that this was an easy, easy way to then get back to the primary business,” explained Latham.

Ransomware is attacking 43% of small businesses, including veterinary clinics.2 When it comes to ransomware, Latham strongly disagrees with paying the ransom because once they know that you are willing to pay, they will continue to attack your software over and over. He gave the example of a veterinary hospital in Arizona that was victim of ransomware and they have paid the ransom 3 times already with Latham predicting they will be hit another 2 times by the hackers.

How are cyber-attacks happening?

According to Latham, one of the top causes for vulnerability in a system is human error. Latham explained that it does not matter how smart you are or how high ranking in a company you are you are always at risk. He gave attendees the example of the Sony company hacking in 2014. The hackers got into the software because they dropped a flash drive labeled ‘Pay Roll’ on the ground in front of…

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ChatGPT’s Use In Medicine Raises Questions Of Security, Privacy, Bias

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Generative AI, the prompt-based artificial intelligence that can generate text, images, music and other media in seconds, continues to advance at breakneck speeds.

Less than six months ago, OpenAI launched its generative AI tool, ChatGPT. A mere four months later, the company released GPT-4, a massive leap forward in processing speed, power and ability.

Every industry has taken notice. Healthcare, in particular. Observers were mildly impressed when the original version of ChatGPT passed the U.S. medical licensing exam, though just barely. A couple of months later, Google’s Med-PaLM 2 aced the same test, scoring in the “expert” category.

Despite mounting evidence that generative AI is poised to revolutionize medical care, patients hesitate to embrace it. According to a recent Pew Research poll, 6 in 10 American adults say they’d feel “uncomfortable” with their doctor relying on artificial intelligence to diagnose disease and provide treatment recommendations.

Today’s iterations of generative AI aren’t ready for broad use in healthcare. They occasionally fail at basic math, make up sources and “hallucinate,” providing confident yet factually incorrect responses. The world is watching closely to see how quickly OpenAI, Google and Microsoft can correct these errors.

But those fixes, alone, won’t address the two biggest concerns patients reported in the Pew survey:

  1. Technological risks, including security, privacy and algorithmic bias.
  2. Ethical concerns about the interplay between machines and humans.

This article examines the first set of fears. The next, on May 8, will cover the ethical ones, including AI’s impact on the doctor-patient relationship.

Are patient fears valid?

Americans have long-held suspicions about new technologies. Recall how bank customers in the 1970s resisted using ATMs, fearing the machines would eat their cards and mishandle their money. Indeed, cashpoint errors were common at first. But when banks made tweaks and the roots of people’s tech-driven fears stopped materializing, the fears themselves…

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Russia Gets a Taste of Its Own Medicine as Hackers Target the Country

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The world is used to Russian hackers being a serious threat to businesses and infrastructure, but the tables have turned, and now Russia is increasingly the focus of attacks.

As Reuters reports(Opens in a new window), Vladimir Putin held a meeting with the Russian government’s Security Council today during which cyber attacks were a focus. Apparently the number of attacks targeting state-owned companies, financial institutions, medical providers, and news websites in the country have increased several-fold.

Putin said, “Targeted attempts are being made to disable the internet resources of Russia’s critical information infrastructure,” and that “Serious attacks have been launched against the official sites of government agencies. Attempts to illegally penetrate the corporate networks of leading Russian companies are much more frequent as well.”

Notable targets for these attacks include Russia’s second largest bank VTB, online marketplace Avito, e-commerce company Wildberries, tech company Yandex, food delivery company Delivery Club, and video hosting website RuTube. Putin believes the best countermeasure is a focus on domestic technology and equipment, while also acknowledging sanctions have meant technical support for foreign software and products has stopped.

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Focusing on domestic technology to make IT systems more resilient may prove much more difficult than Putin realizes. With access to the latest PC hardware disappearing, it seems Russia’s IT future relies on a slow Chinese x86 CPU and legalizing software piracy. And who is going to carry out the work required to improve the protection of state-owned systems, prisoners with IT skills?

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America Has to Make High-Tech Medicine Hack-Proof

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The hack that shut down the Colonial Pipeline has most Americans worried about threats to the nation’s computer network. According to a recent survey by Rasmussen Reports, 85 percent of Americans are at least “somewhat concerned” about the safety of the nation’s computer infrastructure.



a person sitting on a bed: A registered nurse cares for COVID-19 patients in a makeshift ICU at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center on January 21, 2021, in Torrance, California.

© Mario Tama/Getty Images
A registered nurse cares for COVID-19 patients in a makeshift ICU at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center on January 21, 2021, in Torrance, California.

Their concerns are not idle ones—they exist across vital sectors of the economy. Over the last decade, the health care industry has become increasingly vulnerable to ransomware attacks like the one we’ve just been through in the energy sector. Experts have been raising the alarm but thus far their warning cries have not received the attention they deserve.

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That needs to change. Policymakers need to pay attention as these kinds of attacks become more frequent and more expensive. According to a study conducted by Comparitech, in 2020 alone 92 individual ransomware attacks occurred that cost an estimated $20 billion and affected over 600 separate clinics, hospitals and organizations and more than 18 million patient records.

Health care systems rely more and more on devices that use network-integrated software components. These machines—MRI machines, CT scanners and the like—are a vital part of 21st century health care. We cannot do without them so we must take steps to ensure they cannot be hacked. Unfortunately, despite growing vulnerabilities, hospitals and other providers are allowing cost concerns to create a serious security gap that could further jeopardize the integrity of certain medical devices, as well as health systems more broadly: third-party medical device servicing activities.

Online infrastructure must be protected from hackers who can cause life-saving technologies to crash with the push of a button. These technologies are essential to diagnostic and therapeutic services and for patient care. People literally cannot live without them yet it’s not clear they are being protected, especially when they need to be repaired. Problematically, these vulnerabilities are being studied just as…

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