Security for healthcare and life sciences organisations
Healthcare organisations handle some of the most sensitive data in existence. The consequences of a breach go beyond financial loss. They affect real people, clinical partners, and the trust on which the whole system depends.
What makes security in healthcare different
The issues that come up again and again in our work in this sector.
Sensitive data with irreversible consequences
Patient records, DNA data, and clinical trial data cannot be un-exposed once leaked. The harm to individuals is real and lasting. Regulators, investors, and clinical partners treat this accordingly.
Multiple overlapping regulatory requirements
GDPR, NHS DSP Toolkit, HIPAA, and partner-specific security requirements stack on top of each other. Meeting all of them requires understanding which controls actually reduce risk, not just which boxes need ticking.
Significant reputational risks
The deeply emotive and personal nature of the data and services in healthcare, coupled with its large scale, means any breach or disruption can quickly make headlines and cause reputational impact.
High-intensity front line environments
Clinical staff need systems that work immediately. They cannot stop to step through layered security controls, and brittle or legacy technology means changes are resisted to minimise disruption, including things like patching.
The systems we work with
Healthcare systems are often fragmented and deeply interconnected. In clinical environments, machinery used in diagnosis or treatment connects to legacy systems that operate it. Systems run by governments are interspersed with private providers and different hospitals or hospital groups. Some of these are cloud hosted but the majority reside on site. We have seen these environments up close and worked with a number of them, including:
Electronic health record platforms
Genomic/genetic data pipelines
Clinical trial data systems
Trusted Research Environments (TREs)
Verification and authentication processes for illiterate patients
Regulated cloud infrastructure (AWS)
Pseudonymisation and anonymisation systems
Health data APIs
A featured engagement
We have worked with a number of organisations in this sector. This is one engagement we have selected to show how we approach this kind of work.
The Security Partner That Scaled With Them
A UK genomics scale-up was adding security debt faster than it could fix it. Over four years, we helped clear the backlog, hit investor milestones, and come through a first pen test clean.
“Meeting the stringent cybersecurity requirements of our partners while hitting other key milestones to gain investor confidence could not have been done without their thoughtful, pragmatic approach.”
Founder, UK Med Tech Scale-up3 weeks
initial assessment
25–50%
engineering time saved on security work
4 yrs
ongoing security partnership
Working in healthcare?
Speak to us about your situation and whether we can help you.