Posted by Eran Feigenbaum, Director of Security, Google Apps for Work
Companies of all sizes across a number of industries have come to realize that cloud computing is transforming the way they run their business and how people work together. This is especially true for the healthcare industry, where access to information quickly, accurately and securely is vitally important.
That’s why organizations
covered by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) rely on Google’s robust infrastructure to store personal healthcare information. We provide the healthcare industry with the tools they need to help address HIPAA compliance and allow employees to have access to their information when they need it, where they need it.
HIPAA compliance coverage for Google Apps for Work services includes
Gmail, Calendar, Google Drive (including Docs, Sheets, Slides and Forms), Vault and Sites. New and existing Google Apps customers may obtain a
Business Associate Agreement (BAA) from our Google Apps Help Center.
With millions of customers using Google Apps, HIPAA compliance is a critical feature for businesses and organizations that handle health care information, and an important consideration for hospitals, health organizations and governments. Joe Ganneman, CIO for Rockford Orthopedics, a leading bone and joint center in Illinois, believes that “from a HIPAA compliance standpoint, you are actually in a better shape by putting your data in a cloud infrastructure like Google's, than you are trying to store it locally.” And Flint Waters, CIO for the State of Wyoming, says that “using Google Apps made us confident we would meet strict HIPAA requirements and demonstrate to our citizens that their data was on one of the most secure architectures out there.”
HIPAA is just one of
many regulations and standards Google supports, empowering our customers across different industries to benefit from the cloud. For organizations operating in highly regulated sectors, the use of Google’s services provides the tools and protections needed to meet compliance requirements.
