Accessing Medical Files Over P2P Networks

Gov IT writes with this excerpt from NextGov: "Just days after President Obama signed a law giving billions of dollars to develop electronic health records, a university technology professor submitted a paper showing that he was able to uncover tens of thousands of medical files containing names, addresses and Social Security numbers for patients seeking treatment for conditions ranging from AIDS to mental health problems. ... The basic technology that runs peer-to-peer networks inadvertently exposed the files probably without the computer user's knowledge, Johnson said. A health care worker might have loaded patient files onto a laptop, for example, and taken it home where a son or daughter could have downloaded a peer-to-peer client onto the laptop to share music."

Comments

Re:The government doesn't give ...

[mspohr]

I personally pay my taxes by check in the mail and no guns are involved. If you are paying your taxes at gunpoint then I think you may be doing it wrong. Perhaps you are actually paying it to a local bandito group.

There are several things to check. 1. Do you get a receipt? 2. Do they say thank you? 3. Do you have an opportunity to fill out a customer service questionnaire? 4. Do they have a toll free number to call if you have questions about your payment?

If you cannot answer 'Yes' to all of these questions, then the people with guns are probably not a legitimate government and you should call your local sheriff to run them off. (You can find the number for your local sheriff in the telephone book under 'Government services'. The sheriff is funded by your taxes and is happy to assist in running off banditos.)

Re:Wrong issue

[Ihmhi]

but the concept of storing medical info and data in something like Google Docs just leaves me cold and clammy.

Considering that as well as the other symptoms I read on your chart that I downloaded from Limewire, I really think you should see your doctor!