The Success Story of the Healthcare Industry with CodeSign Secure

Company Overview

This healthcare firm stands at the forefront of medical technology and patient data protection, offering innovative health solutions across the United States. Known for its rigorous adherence to HIPAA and other privacy regulations, the organization prides itself on its advanced data encryption and security measures designed to safeguard patient information.

However, it faces ongoing challenges in its code signing operations, which are crucial for ensuring the authenticity and integrity of its software applications. Despite strong cybersecurity practices, the firm struggles with efficiently managing code signing certificates and processes, affecting software deployment timelines and potentially impacting patient care continuity and trust.  It faces challenges, such as a lack of infrastructure protection, insecure devices and firmware, software safety, and malicious macros. 

The Challenges 

1. Lack of infrastructure protection

   Employees in the healthcare sector often seek tools as efficiency is critical in those organizations. However, the implications of downloading software without proper authorization pose significant risks to the organizational infrastructure. This practice can seem harmless to the employee, but the potential consequences for the greater enterprise can be far-reaching.

2. Insecure devices and firmware

   Instead of the importance of updated firmware to ensure reliable and safe operations of the organization’s fleet of IoT-connected devices, it can be considered a commonly unprotected attack surface that cybercriminals exploit to intrude networks, take over control of the devices to cause disruption or harm, or compromise data.

   In a nutshell, insecure firmware equates to an insecure IoT device. Cyberattackers are eager to exploit these weaknesses and gaps in IoT security, not to always attack the devices but to launch other disruptive actions such as DDoS attacks, data breaches or compromise, or malware distribution.

3. Software safety

   A lack of code signing in the organization leads to unprotected software, which, in turn, decreases the organization’s software security posture. Signing your code with a trusted digital certificate ensures only legitimate code is installed in the user’s systems. This helps prevent malware and other malicious codes from infecting the organization’s network.

4. Malicious Macros

   A macro is typically utilized to replace a repetitive series of mouse and keyboard actions common in spreadsheets and word [processing applications like MS Word and MS Excel. A macro virus or malicious macro is a computer virus that replaces a macro.

   When a virus replaces these commands and actions, this can cause significant harm to an organization’s computer systems. In OpenEMR or EHR systems, macro buttons are utilized to quickly input medical codes, patient information, or common medical procedures, improving healthcare providers’ efficiency.

Solutions

1. Role-based access control

   CodeSign Secure enables a robust access control system by supporting integration with LDAP for user authentication and customizable workflows for code signing requests. This handled the insufficient access control mechanisms, which increased the risk of unauthorized users gaining access to code signing capabilities and potentially allowing them to sign code with malicious certificates.

2. HSM Proxy Key Management

   CodeSign Secure leverages FIPS 140-2 validated Hardware Security Modules (HSMs) to protect private keys. It centralizes key and certificate management for improved visibility and control and seamlessly integrates with leading HSM vendors such as Entrust, Thales, etc.

   This mitigated the challenge of Keys and certificates for code signing that were scattered worldwide, causing inconsistent security practices and operational challenges, including inappropriate automation, lifecycle management, and ownership tracking.

3. Integration Strategies

   CodeSign Secure effectively unifies key and certificate management using efficient HSMs, addressing the challenge of limited visibility and control over an extensive inventory of keys and certificates. This resolved the lack of comprehensive visibility and control over an extensive inventory of keys and certificates.

4. Hash Validation

   CodeSign Secure seamlessly integrates hash validation into the code signing process, ensuring the code undergoes rigorous checks against the most recent antivirus definitions before signing. This mitigates the issue of insufficient hash validation against current antivirus definitions, which increases the risk of signing potentially malicious code.

Impact

1. CodeSign Secure enables a robust access control system by supporting integration with LDAP for user authentication and customizable workflows for code signing requests. Unauthorized users are prevented from signing code with potentially malicious certificates, reducing the risk of software compromise and reinforcing trust in digitally signed software.

2. CodeSign Secure leverages FIPS 140-2 validated Hardware Security Modules (HSMs) to protect private keys, centralizes key and certificate management for improved visibility and control, and seamlessly integrates with leading HSM vendors such as Entrust, Thales, etc.

   Harnessing the capabilities of HSMs enhances the security of private keys, protecting unauthorized access, data corruption, or potential misuse. The consolidation of key and certificate management ensures uniformity and reinforces security practices, while effortless integration with various HSM vendors affords adaptability and robust key administration.

3. Implemented an integration strategy that enabled the 32-bit signtool to operate seamlessly on the 64-bit Windows 10 platform. This bridged the compatibility gap, allowing the client to perform macro-signing while upholding security and performance standards. Enabled the client to sign macros (e.g., Excel macro files used to automate tasks on Microsoft Excel) on a 64-bit Windows 10 system with Luna HSM.

4. CodeSign Secure effectively unifies key and certificate management using efficient HSMs, addressing the challenge of limited visibility and control over an extensive inventory of keys and certificates. This streamlined the oversight of keys and certificates distributed across the globe, guaranteeing uniformity and enhanced security.

5. CodeSign Secure seamlessly integrates pre-validation into the code signing process, ensuring code undergoes rigorous checks against the most recent antivirus definitions before signing. This enhanced code signing security by signing only clean, trusted code, reducing the risk of security incidents, and maintaining code integrity.

Conclusion

CodeSign Secure effectively addresses unique challenges, ensuring access control, consolidating key management, enabling secure macro-signing, implementing malware hash validation, and much more. These solutions boost security and enhance trust in digitally signed healthcare applications. CodeSign Secure empowers healthcare organizations to confidently implement code signing, advancing patient privacy and protecting data.