The Security Blog

Today, a CNN.com article stated that, predictably, 

Earlier this week, New Jersey-based Iranian blogger Mehdi Saharkhiz filed a lawsuit in a U.S. federal court against Nokia Siemens Networks on behalf of his father, Isa, who has been in an Iranian prison since July 2009.

In what is sure to be the baseline of its defense, Nokia-Siemens stated that the lawsuit is brought "in the wrong place, against the wrong party and on the wrong premise".   Oddly enough, NSN is not disputing that their equipment was used to spy on Iranian people, a defense they used in the past and now proves to be disingenuous.  There is no doubt that the Nokia-Siemens company, technically managed by a shell group of managers in Germany, we used to perform the surveillance after last year's elections in Iran, and that the result of such surveillance was the arrest, rapes, and executions, of many people who dared speak against the government there.  

Nokia-Siemens also states, to the European Union Parliament, no less, that  they left Iran in early 2009, and that they sold their last monitoring center there in March 2009.  

…soon after our formation as a company, we made a decision to exit from the monitoring center business, and closed a transaction to divest our remaining assets in March 2009, well before the disputed election in June. …

Really?

Nokia Siemens Is Lying.  Again.

The company's own website, has open jobs in Iran:  Want one?

A simple search on Linkedin shows that there are at least 76 people that list their current employer in Iran as Nokia-Siemens.  At least one of them has the title "Country Manager", a title which indicates that (a) there is enough business in that country to need a designated manager and (b) that the company is not based in Iran.  

And here is an employee that started working at NSN-Iran in January 2010.

Isn't it time for Nokia-Siemens to tell the truth?  Should they not divest and stop supporting that despotic, crazy, regime?

As for what we can do?

Well, we need to stop buying Nokia, Siemens, or Nokia-Siemens products.  We need to assess if anyone we find who works for NSN has a professional certification, especially around HR, Security or Networking, and complain to the certification organizations' boards, an ask for those certifications to be revoked (for performing unethical work)

And I would love to hear more ideas on how we can punish the Iranian government…   This Iranian Legal Odyssey should succeed further in punishing the Iranian regime for choosing its pariah way.

On July 8, 2010, the Office of Civil Rights (OCR) of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) issued its long awaited (and for some, dreaded) proposed changes to HIPAA.   While several of the changes are merely ‘procedural’, I find that there are significant changes to certain sections – with some loopholes closed.
I listed below these changes that are not merely procedural, and included my thoughts as to their meaning.   As always, I am available to consult – and repeat: “I am not an attorney”.
 

The changes

Subcontractors

1. The first major change is to Subpart A—General Provisions, Section 160.103—Definitions.  OCR proposes a change whose purpose is to close the loopholes around the definitions of a ‘business associate’.   This is significant, because until now the assumption in some circles was that subcontractors were exempt for many HIPAA provisions.   Of course, that lead to some organizations creating their own ‘subcontractors’ for purposes of sheltering from the regulations.

Medical Error Finders

1. Another change suggested is the inclusion of Patient Safety Organizations.  These organizations, from their very essence, must handle PHI and thus already should have been included.   OCR is requesting specific inclusion of these organizations, or, in their words: “to more clearly align the HIPAA and Patient Safety Rules.”

Data Brokers

1.  The next change relates to the request to specifically include Health Information Organizations (HIO), E-Prescribing Gateways, and Other Persons That Facilitate Data Transmission; as well as Vendors of Personal Health Records.  Again, OCR notes that HITECH (Section 13408) includes these types, but is asking for specific, explicit, inclusion
    

I see dead people

1. The next change requests a declaration that a person’s health records are no longer covered under the Acts if fifty (50) years or more have passed since his death.   That is an interesting change, and I wonder what prompted it.
    

What is a State?

1. This change notes that the US Virgin Islands and American Samoa were left out (by error?) from the original bill and asking for the correction to include these territories.

Privacy

1. With regard to Subpart C—Compliance and Investigations, Section 160.310—Responsibilities of covered entities, the proposed changes would have large PRIVACY impact.   Currently the HIPAA law only allows the secretary of HHS to disclose PHI under very limited guidelines.   Under the proposed change, to which I am adamantly opposed, the Secretary will now be allowed to share Personal HEALTH data with many other agencies (imagine the IRS knowing which hospital you are in and why).

More to come in the next blog entry.

You can find the proposed changes to HIPAA and HITECH also here (PDF)