Threat Matrix: Malware And Hacking Pose Dangers To Medical Devices

'We’re starting to attach medical devices to electronic health records, and they’re not secure.'

The scene from the Showtime series Homeland is tough to watch: The Vice President of the United States, dying slowly as his heart beats faster. His pacemaker – a delicate implanted device, accessed and altered from some distant computer by a terrorist who'd learned its serial number – is going haywire.

It could happen, said Tim Zoph, CIO of Chicago's Northwestern Memorial Hospital, speaking at the Healthcare IT News/HIMSS Media Privacy & Security Forum this past December.

"Fact or fiction?" Zoph asked, clutching an innocuous looking black box – a wireless transmitter used to give instructions to pacemakers – as he scanned the audience.

"The fact is," he said, "they’re not secure."