GlobalSign Survey Reveals Focus on Regulatory Compliance Is Not Improving Security or Privacy

May 26, 2011 - PRLog -- Boston, Mass.—May 26, 2011 – GlobalSign, one of the longest established Certification Authorities (CA) and specialists in SSL Certificate security, today announced results of a survey revealing that a focus on regulatory compliance is not leading to a reduction in data breaches within the healthcare industry. The survey showed that although 56 percent of IT security teams are spending between 25 to 100 percent  of their workweeks devoted to compliance, breaches that cost organizations as much as $100,000 per incident are happening every day.  The survey included responses from 107 IT administrators, managers and C-level executives from organizations of various sizes, with 50 percent working for organizations that employ at least 5,000 people.

Exacerbating the problem is the sheer number of applications and solutions flooding the market that claim to satisfy both security and compliance requirements. In fact, results revealed that 79 percent of respondents find that identifying effective tools that can provide both security and compliance is moderately to extremely challenging.

“This survey validates that healthcare organizations are performing due diligence when it comes to complying with HIPAA, HITECH and other state and federal regulations. It also demonstrates that just checking the boxes on compliance audits will not ensure security or privacy when it comes to sensitive data,” said Lila Kee, chief product officer, GlobalSign. “Organizations need to thoroughly evaluate technologies before making a purchase and deploying. They need to make sure that the solutions they implement can respond to stringent requirements imposed by auditors while actually protecting data and patient privacy.”

In addition to these alarming findings, the survey revealed a number of additional salient points:
•   56 percent of respondents devote 25 to 100 percent of their time to compliance.
•   54 percent of respondents are devoting the most time to HIPAA compliance procedures.
•   37 percent of respondents spend no more than 25 percent of their workweeks devoted to improving security and ensuring data privacy.
•   34 percent of respondents’ organizations have experienced a patient-records data breach within the past two years.
•   10 percent of respondents believe that data breaches that cost organizations $100,000 per incident occur daily.

About GMO GlobalSign
Established in 1996 and as a WebTrust accredited public certificate authority, GlobalSign offers publicly trusted SSL Certificates, EV SSL, Managed SSL Services, S/MIME email security and Code Signing for use on all platforms including mobile devices. Its Trusted Root solution uses the widely embedded GlobalSign Root CA certificates to provide immediate PKI trust for Microsoft Certificate Services and internal PKI, eliminating the costs of using untrusted Root Certificates. Its partnership with Adobe to provide Certified Document Services (CDS) enables secure digitally signed PDF documents, certified transcripts and e-invoices.  These core Digital Certificate solutions allow its thousands of authenticated customers to conduct secure online transactions, data transfer, distribution of tamper-proof code, and protection of online identities for secure email and access control.  The company has a history of innovation within the online security industry and has offices in the US, UK, Belgium, Japan, and China.

GMO Internet Group
GMO Internet Group, headquartered in Japan, is a leading force in the Internet industry offering one of the most comprehensive ranges of Internet services worldwide. The group holds top domestic market share in domain registration, web hosting, and payment processing and provides a host of other Internet services including global online security services, e-commerce solutions, and Internet advertising to both businesses and individuals. At the centre of the group is GMO Internet, Inc. a company listed on the prestigious first section of the Tokyo Stock Exchange . Please visit www.gmo.jp/en for further details.

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Established in 1996 and as a WebTrust accredited public Certificate Authority, GlobalSign offers publicly trusted SSL, including EV SSL Certificates, S/MIME and Code Signing Certificates for use on all platforms including mobile devices.