OREANDA-NEWS. September 04, 2015. Health care providers must protect sensitive data even as changing practices demand that it be more mobile and easily accessible. In response, the Visual Privacy Advisory Council (VPAC), a 3M-sponsored group of data privacy and security thought leaders dedicated to raising awareness on the issue of visual hacking, has selected health care security and privacy expert Kate Borten as its newest member.

The “Fifth Annual Benchmark Study on Patient Privacy and Data Security” released by the Ponemon Institute and sponsored by ID Experts this year revealed that 90 percent of health care organizations experienced at least one data breach in the past two years, while nearly 40 percent experienced more than five breaches. In addition to putting patient data at risk, breaches in healthcare can be costly, with the average cost of a data breach for healthcare organizations estimated to be more than \\$2.1 million, cited Dr. Larry Ponemon, founder of the Ponemon Institute and chairman of the VPAC.

“Kate is a certified information security professional who brings more than 20 years of experience in the health care industry – and deeply complements the VPAC mission,” said Ponemon.

In addition to being a nationally recognized expert in health information security and privacy, Borten is the founder and president of The Marblehead Group, a consultancy group dedicated to privacy and information security primarily within the health care industry. Her previous experience includes the establishment of security programs at Massachusetts General Hospital and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center/CareGroup in Boston.

The purpose of VPAC is to bring awareness and attention to the issue of visual hacking. The council aids organizations in the protection of their sensitive, private and confidential information through the recommendation of policies, tools and best practices. 3M is a proud sponsor of the VPAC.

For more information, visit http://www.stopvisualhacking.org.

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1 Kate Borten is a member of the Visual Privacy Advisory Council and receives compensation from 3M in connection with her participation on the Visual Privacy Advisory Council.