To pass medical audits and maintain HIPAA compliance, most IT leaders focus on securing EHR systems, networks, and cloud environments. But one critical vulnerability is often overlooked—print security. Network and MFD printers, integral to day-to-day operations, handle PHI regularly and, when unsecured, can lead to audit failures, HIPAA violations, or worse: ransomware attacks or data breaches.
Your team likely spends significant time ensuring EHR and network security, but do you have a strategy to secure every device interacting with sensitive patient data?
In 2024, nearly 70% of healthcare breaches involved hacking network servers, often exploiting networked endpoints like printers. Auditors have begun to scrutinize these endpoints with as much rigor as core systems, and failing to secure them can be your biggest compliance gap.
It’s no longer just about network security. Auditors are increasingly focusing on the end-to-end protection of PHI, including how it flows through every device in your system. Even a single unsecured print job left in a tray or a non-encrypted data transmission between a device and printer can lead to HIPAA violations.
For example, in the Concentra Health breach, unsecured printers were part of the vulnerabilities that compromised 4 million patient records. This isn't a unique case—data shows that unsecured print environments are regularly exploited in healthcare data breaches.
Medical audits are evolving, and what was once considered an afterthought—printer security—is now one of the main areas where healthcare organizations are flagged during audits. Auditors are increasingly asking questions like:
If you can’t answer these questions confidently or provide detailed audit logs showing exactly who accessed and printed sensitive information, you risk failing the audit, regardless of how well your EHR systems are protected. To reassure you, you're not alone: 39% of IT leaders aren't confident about, and even more have struggled to prepare, when it comes to printer security.
One of the simplest but most effective ways to protect PHI is through secure print release. This ensures print jobs are only released when the authorized user is physically present at the printer. This prevents unattended documents from sitting in trays, a common point of failure in medical record audits or result in unauthorized access.
Print data must be encrypted in transit and at rest. In 2024, over 15 million healthcare records were compromised due to unencrypted data. Encryption protocols that follow latest security standards ensures that even if print data is intercepted, it remains unreadable and protects your patients, the organization, and frankly, your license or job in healthcare.
Having a detailed audit log for all print activity is non-negotiable during audits. Your logs need to show who printed what, when, and from which device. This level of transparency helps you prove compliance, should auditors request this data, as they often do. Plus, recent studies have been looking into EHR logs to study and develop preventative methods against EHR burden and provider burnout — what's not to get behind?
Failing to address print security can have far-reaching consequences. In addition to HIPAA violations and steep fines, data breaches linked to unsecured print environments erode patient trust. And with business associates and third-party vendors responsible for 40% of healthcare breaches in 2024, securing your print environment across the entire vendor chain is top priority—including hardware partners like Brother or Zebra.
At Tricerat, we know the challenges healthcare IT teams face in securing every endpoint. That’s why we offer Secure Print Solutions designed to help healthcare organizations protect their print infrastructure, reduce the risk of HIPAA violations, and pass medical audits with confidence.
Don’t wait until an audit exposes vulnerabilities in your print security. Visit Tricerat’s Secure Print Solutions today to ensure your print environment is audit-ready and compliant.
