Patches Are Not Just For Our Knees

jeans patch hole materialIf you have not heard the lead-in to the “HIPAA Say What!?!” part of the podcast, you are missing out!  That alone is worth a listen. In episode 268, David and Donna answer a question from a listener from Canada. Does this now make Donna and David an international sensation?  They probably think so.  Listen and find out if Canada has the same issues as we Americans do with vendors signing BAAs, or as they call them in Canada, IMAs.

What trouble does Donna and David see coming this year? Windows 7 end of life issue.  Hello, this is not new guys.  Listen to the Help Me With HIPAA podcast “End of Life For Windows 7 and 2008, Ready? – Ep 223” to help you understand just because it still works, doesn’t mean you can ignore it when it comes to security.  Those devices still running Windows 7, and even still Windows XP, have been called a soft target for cyber criminals.  Let’s upgrade or replace these systems before our networks become easy targets for hackers.  After all, these are considered “low hanging fruit” for hackers.

Now we go from trying to make it difficult for cyber criminals to hack us to how very innocently Window users can get hacked.  That’s right, some of the things that we do everyday can expose us and make it very easy for hackers to infiltrate our networks.  So, what can we do to protect ourselves?  Stay up to date on installing all operating systems and third party software patches.  Software companies are not just creating these patches to have something to do.  They do this to patch vulnerabilities in their software which gives us a fighting chance to ward off the cyber criminals.  Listen to the Help Me With HIPAA podcast “Here Comes Trouble – Ep 268” for all the details.  You will be glad you did.