Why Senior Living Communities Should Care About Security Technology

Demand for senior housing will continue to rise in the coming year’s thanks to an ever-growing supply of baby boomers that are aging and moving into a phase where they begin needing care. The National Investment Center for Seniors Housing and Care has reported that established senior housing occupancy rose to an all-time high in 2015 of just over 90 percent. And in every sector – independent living, assisted living, and nursing care – growth and demand continues to rise.

While this tremendous growth is fueling a host of problems within the industry, security is one that is rarely talked about. There’s a general lack of industry-wide best practice principles, while at the same time there’s a growing sophistication of cyber threats in an increasingly digital world.

Cybersecurity risks transcend all industries. It’s not just banks and financial services companies that are at risk. Target knows this. Anthem knows this. According to an IBM report, healthcare tops the list of targeted industries.

Like other organizations, healthcare businesses are rapidly shifting toward adopting electronic reporting and cloud-based storage of information. Senior living facilities hold sensitive resident, patient and employee data in a variety of ways. Because senior living facilities also store financial information on residents, such as credit card and other banking information, their exposure to hackers is even greater than most. Hackers know this, and often target these facilities, knowing they can fetch a much higher price on the black market for personal health information compared with something like credit card information.

It can also be argued that the health care industry has been slower to adopt security policies than other more technology driven industries. It’s not just the large corporations who are at risk. Small, low profile companies are often more susceptible because they are easier to penetrate and may not notice breaches in an instantaneous fashion. In 2014, Assisted Living Concepts’ payroll services computer system was hacked, putting the risk of about 43,600 employees records at risk, including names, birth dates, Social Security numbers and compensation data.

It’s difficult to know what best practices are, especially when they seem to change every day. When it’s not your primary job function, how can you ever keep up with the demands that come along with securing your data? Senior living has been fortunate until now that hackers haven’t focused on the industry as much as others. But that doesn’t mean the trend will continue.

Data security should be at the top of mind for every C-level executive in every industry. It’s not a matter of if a breach attempt occurs, it’s a matter of when. The more you are prepared, the less potential damage will exist.

We can help.