In light of recent ransomware and other cyberattacks against vendors serving numerous healthcare organizations, it's critical to develop and deploy comprehensive vendor risk management programs, says John Farley of Arthur J. Gallagher & Co., a provider of cyber insurance.

After a data breach, if individuals' stolen information is offered for sale on the dark web, that potentially bolsters class action lawsuits filed by plaintiffs against the breached organization, says technology attorney Steven Teppler of the law firm Mandelbaum Salsburg P.C.

Is it possible that a nation-state actor such as Iran could create a cybersecurity incident that compromises the U.S. power grid? Bernie Cowens, most recently CISO at the nation's largest electric utility, says that's unlikely because the power grid is more cybersecure than you might think.

The latest edition of the ISMG Security Report discusses "Orwellian" surveillance activity in 2020 via the ToTok app. Also featured: the controversy over enabling law enforcement to circumvent encryption; the cyberattack risks posed by IoT devices.

Researchers are attempting to develop new forms of cryptography that could not be cracked by powerful quantum computing devices that are in the works. Divesh Aggarwal, principal investigator at Singapore's Center for Quantum Technologies, describes the efforts.

Healthcare organizations need to carefully assess whether data they hold falls under the scope of the California Consumer Privacy Act, says attorney Anne Kimbol, assistant general counsel of HITRUST - especially now that the regulation's Jan. 1 compliance deadline has hit.

As tensions between the U.S. and Iran continue to rise, healthcare organizations need to exercise extra vigilance in shoring up their security to defend against potential Iranian cyberattacks on critical infrastructure sectors, says Errol Weiss of the Health Information Sharing and Analysis Center.

Complex, manual processes and disparate, disconnected tools make it difficult for security and IT teams to mount a cohesive response. Bryce Schroeder of ServiceNow discusses a more effective approach to vulnerability response.

In the wake of the killing of an Iranian general in a U.S. drone attack last week, organizations - especially healthcare entities and units of government that have been vulnerable to ransomware attacks - need to be on guard against destructive "wiper" attacks, says Caleb Barlow of CynergisTek.

Zero Trust has become a cybersecurity marketing buzzword. But Kelsey Nelson of Okta sheds light on the realities of the Zero Trust approach, with a specific focus on the identity and access management component of the strategy.