Health Care Students Who Frequently Use Facebook Are Unaware of the Risks for Violating HIPAA Standards: A Pilot Study

Social networking creates easy opportunities to violate HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act). The purpose of this study is to determine if students who frequently update their Facebook statuses have the ability to identify certain Facebook postings as HIPAA violations. An anonymous survey was distributed to students on a university campus of a health sciences center, containing questions related to how often Facebook was used or accessed, how often students updated their Facebook statuses, and whether they could identify if specific online postings constituted HIPAA violations. Students’ HIPAA scenario responses were compared to their frequency of Facebook status updates, and students who frequently updated their information were more likely to incorrectly identify a HIPAA violation—namely, photos of patients posted to Facebook, even those devoid of identifying information. No other HIPAA violation scenarios demonstrated an association with frequencies of use or status updates. Further research needs to be conducted to see what traits or behaviors put students at risk for violating HIPAA through social networking sites.