Risk Assessment For nonprofit hospital Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Risk Assessment For nonprofit hospital - Essay Example Evidently, the industry is highly vulnerable to information theft more than ever before. In modern healthcare settings, risk factors are impulsive and hence comprehensive risk assessment programs are essential to meet the challenges. According to the current day concept, risk assessment is not simply a precaution but a preventive healthcare approach that mitigates the impacts of a number of risk factors (The National Patient Safety Agency, 2007). Why Risk Assessment It has been stated that â€Å"each technical advance brings new security holes† (Rogers, 2011, p. 2). According to the writer, storing data over the internet involves incessant threat from hackers and malware. Burger (2010) describes the Kern medical center’s intense struggle with computer virus to regain its data, for the virus had downloaded ‘tons of porn documents’ and crashed all computers causing great dilemma. The incident has been cited by many experts to show that hospital data is always vulnerable to identity theft. For instance, Fell (2010) also points out that hospital computer systems are under the threat of information theft referring to the mayhem caused by virus at Kern Medical Center. According to the officials of UC Davis Police Department, the author says that "Hospitals are a soft target where a cyber attack can cause a lot of damage quite easily† (as cited in Fell, 2010). ... 3-5), the business environment highly involves intense competition and technical complexity which raise considerable amount of vulnerability risk to organizations of every type. Hence it is important to have a reliable risk assessment program for every firm to ensure the security of their data and other areas of organizational functions. And risk assessment in the view of the writers is â€Å"a systematic process for describing and quantifying the risks associated with hazardous substances, processes, action, or events† (Covello & Merkhoher 1993, p.3). Risk Assessment Tools There are certain effective free vulnerability scanning tools that can help non-profit organizations to address this issue. Nessus is one of the most important security vulnerability scanning tools. The website gives very detailed information about the vulnerability scanning tool-Nessus. The site has included several frequently asked questions and their answers along with the basic instructions for its user s. A close analysis of Nessus’ official website gives a clear picture of its total functions (Nessus). The relevance of Nessus has been well described in Rogers (2011). According to the author, tools like Nessus have been helping organizations to assess the vulnerability of their systems. It can also be used to check for misconfiguration vulnerabilities like open mail relay and missing patches (p.291). Evidently, Nessus is widely accepted as the most comprehensive vulnerability scanning program available today, for it helps clients to assess the level of their system’s vulnerability to data theft or virus attack (Nessus: online encyclopedia). The website, SecTools.Org conducts regular surveys to identify and list the community’s favorite software through multiple