Health Information Management

OMB: Agencies must ensure remote security

HIPAA Weekly Advisor, July 10, 2006

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Federal departments have 45 days to ensure their security procedures meet the recommendations of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), according to a memo released June 23 by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB).

The memo targets practices that led to the recent theft of a Department of Veterans Affairs laptop containing sensitive information for more than 26 million veterans.

In addition to the NIST standards, the OMB recommended that agencies take the following actions:

  • Encrypt all sensitive data on mobile computers/devices
  • Allow remote access only with two-factor authentication, where one of the factors is provided by a device separate from the computer gaining access
  • Use a timeout function for remote access and mobile devices that requires the user to reauthenticate after 30 minutes of inactivity
  • Log all computer-readable data extracts from sensitive databases and verify that each extract has been erased within 90 days or is still being used

Click here to read the OMB memo.



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