February 6, 2013. Today, we cover the business associate Administrative Safeguard (b) of the Security Rule, as modified by the Final Rule: Modifications to the HIPAA Privacy, Security, Enforcement, and Breach Notification Rules Under the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act [HITECH Act] and the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act; Other Modifications of the HIPAA Rules, which was published in the Federal Register on January 25, 2013. The effective date of the Final Rule is March 26, 2013, and covered entities and business associates must comply by September 23, 2013. HIPAA did not directly regulate business associates of covered entities. The HITECH Act’s 13401 statutorily changed that: The…
Tag: physical safeguard
Final HIPAA Rule: Security Statutory Authority and Direct Regulation of Business Associates
February 4, 2013. Today, we cover the security safeguards of the HIPAA Security Rule, as Modified by the Final Rule: Modifications to the HIPAA Privacy, Security, Enforcement, and Breach Notification Rules under the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act [HITECH Act] and the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act; Other Modifications of the HIPAA Rules, which was published in the Federal Register on January 25, 2013. The effective date of the Final Rule is March 26, 2013, and covered entities and business associates must comply by September 23, 2013. The statutory authority for applicability of the HIPAA Security Rule is in Section 13401 of the HITECH Act (123 STAT….
OCR Publishes HIPAA/HITECH Act Privacy and Security Compliance Audit Protocol
July 9, 2012. Late in June, the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) published its HIPAA/HITECH Act Privacy and Security Compliance Audit Protocol. Here is OCR’s description of the program, which outlines 77 audit procedures for the HIPAA Security Rule and 88 audit procedures for the HIPAA Privacy and HITECH Act Breach Notification Rules: “The OCR HIPAA Audit program analyzes processes, controls, and policies of selected covered entities pursuant to the HITECH Act audit mandate. OCR established a comprehensive audit protocol that contains the requirements to be assessed through these performance audits. The entire audit protocol is organized around modules, representing separate…
Technical Safeguard Standards of the HIPAA Administrative Simplification Security Rule
There are five technical safeguard standards: access control, audit controls, integrity, person or entity authentication, and transmission security. Each standard has implementation specifications, which can be required or addressable. Remember, addressable does not mean “optional.” Rather, an addressable implementation specification means that a covered entity must use reasonable and appropriate measures to meet the standard. As we have noted in earlier postings on HIPAA.com, business associates of covered entities will be required to comply with the Security Rule safeguard standards, beginning February 17, 2010. This requirement is one of the HITECH Act provisions of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), signed by President Obama on February 17, 2009. Technical…