Have undertaken various measures in collaboration with CERT-In against cyber threats: Govt in LS

New Delhi: The Union Health Ministry has undertaken various measures in collaboration with the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) to ensure data security and protect the privacy of patients from cyber threats, the Lok Sabha was told on Friday.

Advisories issued by the CERT-In are disseminated to all authorised medical care entities and service providers in the country for compliance, Minister of State for Health S P Singh Baghel said in a written reply in the Lower House.

These include advisories on the latest cyber threats or vulnerabilities and countermeasures, guidelines on information security practices for government entities and specifically for health, data and network security and identity and access management, application security, third-party outsourcing, hardening procedures, security monitoring, incident management and security auditing, he said.

On observing any cybersecurity incidents highlighted by the CERT-In, remedial actions are taken as per its direction and guidance, Baghel said.

He said cybersecurity mock drills are conducted in consultation with the CERT-In and NIC in all divisions of the Union health ministry.

Besides, regular training programmes are conducted in collaboration with CERT-In, CDAC (Centre for Development of Advanced Computing) and National Informatics Centre (NIC) for sensitisation of all program divisions regarding securing the IT infrastructure and mitigating cyberattacks.

As per security audit guidelines and advisories issued by the NIC, necessary measures are taken by the health ministry to enforce data security and privacy at the web application end.

The ministry has launched the Ayushman Bharat Digital Mission (ABDM), which aims to develop the backbone necessary to support the integrated digital health infrastructure of the country and create longitudinal Electronic Health Record (EHR) for the citizens, Baghel stated.

The National Health Authority (NHA) has issued several guidelines and notifications to govern the conduct of digital health applications, which are integrated with the ABDM ecosystem.