Kevin McDonald

Hacks on Health Care: How to Make a Vulnerable Industry Cyber-Secure

Kim McCleary, Joshua Corman, Kevin McDonald, Suzanne Schwartz, Mark Wilson, Josh Tenenbaum, Martha Minowski

Led by Kim McCleary, a panel of industry experts and regulators detailed how the convergence of legacy medical devices, severe talent shortages, and immense costs has created a "critical condition" for healthcare cybersecurity in the United States. Highlighting the Hollywood Presbyterian ransomware attack and a BlackBerry demonstration of infusing pump vulnerabilities, the discussion established that proof of potential harm is now sufficient for FDA intervention while exposing the market's $100-per-record data value and the impossibility of total technical prevention. To address these systemic risks, stakeholders were advised to integrate security into patient safety cultures, mandate transparency in device procurement, and leverage the NIST framework to shift focus toward risk containment and continuous response rather than unattainable prevention.