Sailing the stormy seas of FOIA, FERPA, HIPAA data challenges with Smartbox.ai
Public sector data requests are a minefield of legislation and compliance issues that can result in crippling fines and penalties for companies and organizations if they are not adhered to.
This blog will cover three separate, yet major areas of legislation that are heavily influenced by State privacy laws: The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), Family Education Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) and the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), and explain how, by working with Smartbox.ai, you can streamline your compliance processes, save time and avoid being penalized when dealing with multiple data requests.
Diving Deeper into the legislation
Since 1967, FOIA has enabled American citizens, organizations, universities, businesses and state/local governments to request access to records of the executive branch of the US Government. This has been further complicated by the California Public Records Act (CPRA), passed in 1968 by the California Legislature which is aimed at government agencies, and requires that government records are disclosed to the public when requested, unless they are associated with privacy and/or public safety exemptions that could prevent disclosure. Ultimately adds extra layers of work for the people having to deal with the data requests.
Data requests under FOIA require significant redaction before the information can be disclosed; the documents are long and complex, are packed with third-party data, and are labor intensive. Organizations need to follow an auditable process that checks for third-party data, business sensitive information and also information that is classed as classified. The documents can also contain data that is handwritten or even still in paper format, again adding to the time spent preparing the document for release.
The FERPA Act was released in 1974, and is aimed at protecting a student’s educational data, giving them or other organizations the rights to see, manage and request a copy of their education records. For obvious reasons, children’s data is one of the most protected data of all, and these types of records contain a lot of sensitive data such as names, addresses, plus personal information on a student’s mental health, well-being and performance. Then there is the third-party data mentioning other students or even staff details that needs redacting. It can be a complete minefield.
Again, educational records can contain a lot of handwritten or paper-based material, all of which will need digitalizing and protecting, equating to hours of extra time spent processing each data request.
Thirdly, and by no means least, is the HIPAA act from 1996, designed to prevent sensitive health information from being disclosed without a patient’s consent and knowledge.
Because the US health system is private, medical records are shared extensively with health plan providers, hospitals and insurance companies as a matter of course, but data requests can be made for a number of other reasons including individuals looking to access their own records, but also people looking to get hold of medical records for nefarious purposes.
With these types of documents, key information – known as Protected Health Information (PHI) needs to be redacted. The documents are long and complex and could contain classified information. So, the task of sifting through these documents and not only redacting everything that needs to be redacted but actually finding the relevant information requested, is time-consuming and extremely challenging.
Then there is the additional challenge of identifying and redacting information that could identify another person and their medical information, and removing keywords that could trigger a patient.
And again, just like with FOIA and FERPA, medical records contain a significant amount of handwritten and paper-based documents.
What could go wrong?
Due to the sheer volume of work needed for each data request, the likelihood of human error, simply failing to spot key information due to tiredness, or time constraints, is extremely high. The work is extremely boring for the individuals involved and it is preventing them from getting on with other work that might actually benefit their company or organization more.
Violating one of these laws can also significantly impact a company or organization’s reputation, resulting in loss of faith from customers, which is difficult to get back.
But the biggest issue with any privacy violation is the financial implications, which will either hit the public purse, or a business’ top line.
Under FOIA, local officials found to be in breach of the rules can be fined up to $5,000.
Penalties under FERPA are significant, and can result in the Department of Education withholding budgets – as much as eight percent of a school or college’s total budget. That would have a direct impact on students and employees at that particular establishment.
Similarly, the penalties under HIPAA can be crippling. Penalties can range from $63,973 per violation to an eye-watering $1.9 million per annum. Plus, custodial sentences can also be imposed by the Office for Civil Rights (OCR).
In short, with the technology available today that can avoid violations happening in the first place, it is surely not worth taking the risk.
How Smartbox.ai can help
By using Smartbox.ai technology, we can help to streamline the entire data request review and redaction process through automation. FOIA, FERPA and HIPAA data requests will never be a headache again.
Our technology and tools will significantly reduce the likelihood of a privacy violation by identifying and highlighting all personally Identifiable Information (PII), and also identifying duplicates.
We use dictionaries to highlight any specific risk indicators such as words relating to sensitive information to pinpoint areas that need extra attention. Smartbox.ai also automatically converts files into a PDF and will bulk redact at speed.
Our technology can save a whopping 80 percent of time taken to respond to each data request, meaning your people are freed up to focus on other, likely more enjoyable areas of the business, which can boost growth. Smartbox.ai will help your people work smarter, not harder, yet the benefits will be significant. A happier, fulfilled workforce means a more profitable business.
Let us take the pain out of complex data requests and give you peace of mind over privacy law compliance. Book your 30-minute demo
with one of our experts: https://smartbox.lislex.xyz/book-a-demo