Breaches of Protected Health Information (PHI) have been in the news a lot lately. In a recent report by Beazley (a specialty risk insurance company), it shows that 41% of data breaches are the restult of unintended disclosure (human error). 

Human Error is almost twice the level of the second highest cause of loss, which is from a 'hack or malware' (19%). 

The third highest cause of loss is when employees snoop in patients files without permission or a work reason (15%), which again show the need for increased training and contols. 

According to the study the average settlements for PHI breaches increased to $1.8M in 2016-17, compared to $1M in 2014-15. 

For more information, check out the Beazely Study: https://www.beazley.com/documents/TMB/Insights/201710-beazley-breach-insight-healthcare.pdf