Intel Community Assessment: Health Care System at Risk of Cyber Attack - Intel Agencies Raise Alarm While Administration Activates HealthCare.Gov Despite Security Warnings

Intel Agencies Raise Alarm While Administration Activates HealthCare.Gov Despite Security Warnings

WASHINGTON, DC – The U.S. Intelligence Community’s 2014 Worldwide Threat Assessment, released late last week, highlights the risk of cyberattack on the American health care system.

“The US health care sector, in particular, is rapidly becoming networked in ways never before imagined,” the assessment said. “As health care services become increasingly reliant on the cross-networking of personal data devices, medical devices, and hospital networks, cyber vulnerabilities might play unanticipated roles in patient outcomes.”

The worldwide threat assessment, a collaborative public document authored annually by the sixteen agencies of the American Intelligence Community, offers an overview of the primary threats to the national security of the United States.

The document lists the cyber threat as the first and foremost among others, including the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, terrorism and counterintelligence.

Rep. Patrick Meehan, Chairman of the Homeland Security Committee’s Subcommittee on Cybersecurity, has been a leader in calling attention to potential security vulnerabilities in the health care system resulting from the Affordable Care Act.

“Sixteen intelligence agencies agree that the threat of cyberattack is the greatest threat to our security America faces today,” said Meehan. “The threat assessment, for the first time ever, specifically highlights the risk of an attack on our nation’s health care system. And yet just a few months ago, the Administration took HealthCare.Gov live despite serious concerns about the system’s security. The Administrator of the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services admitted just weeks before launching the site, she had no communication with these security officials on the cyber threat.”

“The Intelligence Community takes the threat of attack on our health care system seriously, and so do the American people. It’s time the Administration comes clean about the site’s vulnerabilities, lays out a plan to fix them, and explain to the American people what went wrong and why.”