Meet Memorial’s Cybersecurity Team
Our Security Operations Center works tirelessly to protect our patients and team members each day. This Cybersecurity Awareness Month, learn more about what they do and how important their work is to our health system and community!
Rafe G. is an Information Systems Senior E-Security Analyst at Memorial. He shares, “The patient experience relies on the hospital functioning as a single body. We [Security Operations Center (SOC)] function in a similar way as the immune system. We monitor and act on internal and external threats that would impact patient privacy as well as system availability. Ways to accomplish this are to influence policies as technology changes, to participate in continual training for employees on email security, and to monitor system activity.”
There’s no “average day”
As you might expect, every day there are new threats and there is no “average day” for the SOC. IS e-Security Analyst Michael H. says, “Some days we start off with troubleshooting a sudden loss of network outage with no apparent cause, and in the next minute we are collecting forensic information related to a possible crime.”
There is an old saying “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure”, and this holds true in the IT/e Security world. IS e-Security Analyst Stephen C. shares, “We spend a lot of time and effort developing ways to identify behaviors that can be used by attackers to break into our network. We routinely develop training to make our employees more aware of emerging threats that attackers tend to use. We also audit and test our own systems looking for known vulnerabilities to try and make them more secure to protect our patient information. We also work closely with the privacy officer and respond to possible privacy violations in an effort to assist with keeping our hospital compliant and accountable to federal laws and organizations.”
There is also the most important part of this team’s job: investigating concerns employees bring to them. “Memorial is a team, and through sending us security concerns, by reporting phishing emails, calls, or through tickets put into the service desk, our employees are helping make Memorial Health System a safer and more secure network,” says IS Senior e-Security Analyst Annie L.
A passion for safety
The Memorial e-Security team adds, “We chose our jobs because we love what we do, and we care very deeply about the hospital and our patients. We spend a large amount of time researching, vetting, and auditing hospital resources to promote cost reductions, operability, and security of Memorial Health System. We believe that we have made a significant impact on patient and employee safety. Anything we do or suggest is intended to support the hospital and make our patients safer.”
We thank you for your dedication to our patients, team, and community! For more information about how you can keep yourself safe against cyber threats, click here.