04 Nov U.S. CIO Tony Scott cautions about inherent threats of maximum interoperability
Tony Scott is perhaps the biggest bigwig in information technology. He is the CIO of the United States, with an office on the White House campus. He is the third CIO of the United States, appointed by President Barack Obama on February 5, 2015. When it comes to IT in the government: What he says, goes.
Scott gave a special address to attendees at the CHIME 2016 CIO Fall Forum, where he emphasized two key points about the realm of IT today: the process of digitization and the threat inherent in maximum interoperability.
Scott discussed a key matter in health IT today, which, according to him, is the threat posed by the technical paradigm of the last 40 years: maximum interoperability.
“It’s a design principle that has served us really well — until now,” he said. “The specs have gotten so good, manufacturing has gotten so good, it’s just assumed everything is going to work. We have focused on interoperability as the prime design point, but we have failed to go the next step: I can interoperate with you, but should I? Is that thing I am hooking up to reliable, is it what it represents itself to be, or is it masquerading as something, or is it truly operating the way it should? There is a whole set of questions that now one really wants to ask with a cybersecurity lens in mind.”
Read full article at Healthcare IT News