How to protect your personal health information

Published: May 17, 2017 | Updated: May 8, 2019

Cyberattacks seem to be in the news at an increasing rate. They can put confidential personal information at stake, including Social Security numbers, credit card information, bank accounts and, yes, personal health information.

If you are a Norton Healthcare patient, you have access to MyNortonChart, a secure online source for your personal health information. You can even see a health professional through an online medical visit. With all of this private information out there, how do you keep it safe?

Seven things you can do to help protect yourself:

• Never open email attachments if you do not know the sender.
• Do not give out personal information over the phone or in an email unless you are completely sure you are sharing it with a trusted organization. Social engineering is a process of deceiving individuals into providing personal information to seemingly trusted agents who turn out to be hackers or scammers.
• Create secure passwords and don’t share them with anyone.
• Change passwords frequently.
• Do not forward or open coupons.
• Do not forward or open chain emails.
• Be suspicious of unknown links or requests sent through email or text message.

What is Norton Healthcare doing to keep patient information safe?

Many safeguards are in place to ensure only the people who need your health information have access to it. Patient information is protected through many layers of passwords, encryption and technical safeguards.

“Our priority within the information services department is the protection of Norton Healthcare patient and employee data,” said Steve Ready, system vice president of information services and chief information officer. “We continue to take the necessary measures to ensure both our technical and informational resources are secured.”