Site Analysis

While it may be difficult to learn all of the ways that criminals may attack a website, awareness and preparation can go a long way towards mitigating the damage caused by hackers. An important first step to preventing problems is selecting software carefully and with security in mind.

Requirements:

Consider the scenario that you are working as an IT Director for a hospital considering the selection of a web-based electronic health record (EHR) system.

Using both your understanding of the architecture behind web applications and your awareness of some of the many ways web applications are attacked, prepare a survey or list of questions that can be asked of EHR vendors who are presenting demonstrations and sales pitches regarding their web-based EHR products.

The answers to these questions will be used to compare the EHRs you are considering in terms of how well they would protect patient data from theft, denial of service, or other kinds of compromise.

Your survey should include the following criteria:

• Contain open-ended questions - Do not just ask "yes" or "no" questions.

• Be specific in terms of types of attack protected against.

• Be specific in terms of architecture components.

• Be sure that your questions specifically address the Web-Based security considerations of the EHR.

• Be 1 pages in length, double-spaced,

• Be free of spelling, grammar, and punctuation errors.