Hackers who breach security firewalls could potentially kill patients wearing remote-controlled pacemakers or insulin pump devices, according to Tanya Vogt, executive officer of the SA Medical Technology Industry Association.
The main reason behind hacking of medical devices is usually the same as any cyber crime – identity theft and fraud, the conference heard.
Speaking at the Hospital Association of SA’s annual conference in Cape Town on Tuesday, Vogt said the country is behind the international risk curve when it comes to legislation around recall and adverse events linked to medical devices.
This is despite SA having basic certification and guidelines on safety and performance for these devices. Credible manufacturers needed some kind of regulatory approval, but even this did not help much when it came to the ability of hackers to access real-time monitoring of connective devices, delegates were told.
Black market sales
Braam Oberholzer, head enterprise architect at Netcare and a pioneer in medical device software, said at the conference in Cape Town that last year already 15 million medical records globally were disclosed. Half way through this year, the number of…
