Medical Insecurity Worse for Identity Theft

Illegally purchased medical records fetch huge sums of money on black markets
 about $50 an account. Credit cards, on the other hand fetch only $1 each.

. . Criminals can use medical records to fraudulently bill insurance or Medicare, use patients' identities for free consultations, or pose as patients to obtain prescription medications that can later be sold on the street.
. . As medical offices are pushed by the Affordable Care Act to turn paper patient records into digital files they typically don't take the extra step to protect those files -- making them easier than ever for a hacker to quietly steal en masse.  They rarely encrypt all of the data they keep on us.  Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act doesn't demand it. Furthermore, many are using outdated technology that no longer receives security updates. For example, Community Health Systems allowed hackers access to employees' login credentials because it was slow to patch the infamous Heartbleed bug.

. . For more read, 90% of hospitals and clinics lose their patients' data at  http://money.cnn.com/2014/08/20/technology/security/hospitals-data/