The Benefits of HITRUST for Non-Healthcare Organizations
Cybersecurity tactics and best practices constantly evolve as new threats emerge. And it doesn’t matter how great your security is if third-party vendors aren’t as prepared.
This is why The HITRUST CSF exists — to establish standards dedicated to protecting sensitive information.
HITRUST is a standards organization focused on security, privacy and risk management. HITRUST CSF was developed to provide healthcare organizations with a comprehensive security and privacy program.
Though it’s been historically targeted toward organizations in the healthcare industry, the HITRUST CSF has been gaining traction in other sectors. With malicious attacks on the rise, companies across all industries should consider adopting the HITRUST CSF to minimize risk exposure.
Why the HITRUST CSF is Popular Among Healthcare Organizations
HITRUST was founded in 2007 to make information security a focus of the healthcare industry. This standard gives customers confidence in knowing their data and confidential information are secure.
Many healthcare organizations are required to maintain HIPAA compliance. HIPAA, or the Healthcare Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, is a U.S. law that establishes a set of safeguards that covered entities must follow to protect health information.
However, there is no official way to measure HIPAA compliance. The HITRUST CSF provides a list of prescriptive controls or requirements that can demonstrate compliance, making the CSF a certifiable security and privacy framework. Therefore, it was an essential complement to HIPAA compliance for healthcare organizations.
Why Other Industries Should Adopt the HITRUST CSF
In 2019, HITRUST made the CSF industry agnostic. This made it possible for organizations in any industry to pursue the certification — although many organizations are unaware of the benefits HITRUST Certification can provide their teams.
HITRUST Certification is not mandated by law. Still, the HITRUST CSF is considered the most comprehensive cybersecurity and privacy framework because of the way it maps to over 40 other security and privacy standards, including HIPAA, SOC 2, NIST SP 800-53 and ISO 27001, just to name a few.
The HITRUST CSF allows organizations to combine several assessments and standards into one framework. Organizations decide what regulatory factors they want to include in their assessment based on the level of risk and the regulatory requirements.
By taking an “assess once, report many” approach, assessors can perform several different audits while the organization feels like they’re only undergoing one — saving time, money, and resources.
Key Industries that Could Benefit from HITRUST Adoption
Even though most industries will benefit from adopting the HITRUST CSF, several industries could reap more significant rewards while using this framework.
Hospitality
Hotels, lodging facilities, and travel booking sites are at an increased risk of virtual attacks, such as the Marriott data breach that occurred in mid-2022.
That’s why major players in the industry now require strict adherence to security and privacy best practices. Sabre, for example, is the largest technology platform for booking and payment applications in the hospitality industry. In 2019, Sabre began requiring its vendors to provide a HITRUST CSF Assessment, as the company wanted a way for its vendors to demonstrate the effectiveness of their information privacy and security controls.
Suppose hospitality organizations want to keep using Sabre as their primary booking and payment application. In that case, the organizations must undergo a HITRUST CSF Assessment to ensure they are safely managing customer data.
Utilities
Strong security is essential for utility companies. The nation’s critical infrastructure system could crumble without stable access to necessities like water and electricity.
With critical infrastructure coming under increased attacks, as seen with Russia’s attacks on Ukraine’s electrical grid, many nations worldwide are focusing on protecting vital resources. To help mitigate the risk of an attack, organizations need to take a proactive approach to cybersecurity, such as adopting a framework like the HITRUST CSF.
Organizations with International Customers
While not technically an industry of its own, organizations with a large number of international customers will benefit from the adoption of the HITRUST CSF.
In 2018, the EU adopted the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) to protect the private information of those in the European Union. However, similar to the case with HIPAA, there is no official way to measure GDPR compliance.
Adding GDPR to a HITRUST assessment is a great approach for addressing the questions and concerns clients may have about your organization’s GDPR compliance.
The Singapore Personal Data Protection Act shares many similarities with GDPR, although this international regulation only applies to Singapore. Along the same vein, the Brazilian General Data Protection Law (LGPD) has also gained popularity in recent years, once again demonstrating how many privacy laws have been adopted worldwide.
With no formal certification process for many of these new regulations, organizations that are currently doing business or are looking to do business overseas should add additional regulations to their HITRUST assessment to better demonstrate data safety.
Get Started with HITRUST
Organizations across all industries need to ensure they can protect any data that might be shared. One of the best ways to do this is by achieving HITRUST Certification.
The HITRUST CSF Certification draws from multiple well-known, pre-existing frameworks to provide a complete, certifiable security and privacy standard. With the foundation already set, many see that their HITRUST Certification simplifies the process of satisfying other requirements.
With more than 400 successful HITRUST Assessments completed, A-LIGN’s team of HITRUST experts is here to answer any questions and walk you through the entire certification process.
Interested in learning more about HITRUST CSF? Complete the form below and one of our cybersecurity and compliance professionals will reach out within 24 hours.
