Is Microsoft Teams HIPAA Compliant?

Any health-related organization needs to maintain its HIPAA compliance. If your organization deals with health-related and personally identifiable information, that’s you. But compliance can be a tricky topic, especially as technology is introduced. How can you achieve better HIPAA compliance with services like Microsoft Teams?

What is HIPAA Compliance?

As health-related data has increasingly become digitized, HIPAA compliance has become necessary to improve security and privacy. HIPAA compliance guarantees privacy for Protected Health Information (PHI). PHI must be secure and protected.

Understandably, this leads to complications when it comes to the management and maintenance of health-related data. How do organizations discuss health-related information while still making sure that it’s secure? How does a health organization make it possible for those who need the information to be able to access it, while protecting it from others?

The right platforms help.

MS Teams Features to Help HIPAA Compliance

Microsoft Teams is a collaborative communication solution that makes it easier for individuals and groups to interact. Teams can be used to host video chats, voice chats and other online meetings, as well as having separate team channels for trading files and information.

A few features of MS Teams that aid with HIPAA compliance include:

• A consolidated communication platform. Because MS Teams can support any type of communication, from voice to video, all communication can be handled through a single platform. A single platform is far easier to secure and maintain than multiple platforms.
• Audit controls. If a HIPAA audit does occur, all files can be immediately locked, and tracking data can be reviewed. Teams keeps track of everyone who accesses, creates, modifies and deletes files, to provide better paper trails.
• Data encryption. Data on MS Teams can be thoroughly encrypted, to reduce the risk of others accessing personally identifiable or protected health information. Health clinics can often be a target for attacks because they often have enough information to commit identity theft.
• Login and security controls. Through MS Teams, organizations can better protect data by authorizing users only to view and modify the things that they should be able to. Even if accounts are compromised, limited data will be compromised. Temporary permissions can be granted for things that the user doesn’t need continuously but may need access to temporarily.
• Regular updates and security patches. MS Teams, like the rest of Office 365, is regularly updated and patched. Organizations won’t need to do a lot to maintain the security of their systems, which is critical to the security of the data. Zero=day bugs (bugs that have been just found) are responsible for many data breaches, as attackers know to look for systems that haven’t yet been healed in order to compromise them.

But it must be understood that these features need to be used properly if they are going to be effective. For instance, MS Teams consolidates information, so the organization only needs to track a single platform. But if users start to trade information off-platform (such as through their email accounts), it will no longer be protected.

Maintaining HIPAA Compliance with MS Teams

As with any solution, maintaining HIPAA compliance is really a matter of security, processes and protocols. Any software solution won’t be able to guarantee HIPAA compliance if users don’t use it properly. But it can facilitate it.

There are specific ways to maintain HIPAA compliance with Microsoft Teams:

• Restrict data sharing and communication to MS Teams. The more information flows through MS Teams, the better and more thoroughly it can be protected. Teams can integrate with the rest of Office 365 which provides similar protections.
• Review and restrict permissions for users. Users should always be granted only the permissions they strictly need to do their jobs. Further, these permissions should be regularly audited, and they should be removed immediately when employees leave.
• Digitize and consolidate all data. Having paper data is now a significant security concern. Paper information should be regularly shredded, and all data should be consolidated within the Teams environment.
• Regularly audit compliance. Regular audits can identify any security gaps in the system, as well as properly closing them.

Microsoft Teams has a variety of features open to help with HIPAA compliance — if used properly. And these systems are best used properly from the start. An MSP can help your organization setup your MS Teams and Office 365 system to achieve better compliance throughout.

Are you concerned about Microsoft Teams HIPAA compliance? Do you need to learn more? Contact Red River today to find out what an MSP and MS Teams can do for you.