Your Electronic Health Record might be at stake: Stay alarmed

Your data is becoming digitally advanced day by day and the companies you trust your data with, are also advancing in this field. Hence, it becomes the need of the hour for users to realize that their data could be at high risk. For instance, when you walk into your medical care provider’s workplace you have to fill up a form that provides your medical practitioner with your personal information. This info is then transferred to a computer for keeping the record. You simply trust that our information is stored securely. Unfortunately, the medical data breach is increasing with the increase in digitalization. 

This medical data breach has occurred in many places. Patient’s personal information such as names, addresses, birth dates, account balance information, and credit and debit card details were exposed resulting in cyber-criminal activities. 

Medical data removal is quite impossible, making it vulnerable to hacking. McAfee Labs discovered that there are a lot of vulnerabilities that exist in the medical field, such as the capability to create admin accounts remotely and unencrypted traffic between servers which can disclose our personal information to cybercrooks. 

Cybercriminals are constantly giving power to their hacking mechanism and changing their targets in order to accomplish their goals. Medical data is serving as a good means to cybercriminals. McAfee Advanced Threat Research Team conducted a survey in which it was found that many of the incidents were a result of the failures to fulfill the security practices or the information vulnerabilities in software used at workplaces. 

Tips to keep your crucial information secured

Although it is the duty of the medical care provider to take the essential steps for keeping patient’s data secured, you can also practice caution to help maintain your privacy. To do so, you can check out the following tips: 

· Apply a fraud alert- you can place a fraud alert on your credit or debit card if you doubt that your data has been compromised. This ensures that every new transaction undergoes scrutiny. In addition to this, it allows you to have duplicate copies of your credit report so that you can keep a check on suspicious activities. 

· Freeze your credit- freezing your credit will ensure that criminals cannot take loans or open an account on your behalf. 

· Use McAfee Identity Theft Protection available at mcafee.com/activate- a solution like this not only helps you to keep a check on your account by alerting you of suspicious activities but also helps to regain the incurred losses. 

· Check your accounts at regular intervals- be vigilant about what is going on in your surroundings. Frequently check your bank account details to check if an unusual activity or online transaction has not been made through your account. 

Conclusion-
It is recommended to think twice before providing your information to any person or institution. Also, stays updated of all the latest cyber threats and keep your devices secured with solutions provided by McAfee.