In an apparent attempt to stimulate HIPAA lawyers, Congress included in the
American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (“ARRA”), known as the Economic Stimulus Package, provisions to revise and increase the scope of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (“HIPAA”), the primary federal statute governing the privacy of an individual’s health information. The primary impact is to increase the number of parties subject to HIPAA; specify when and how HIPAA-covered entities deal with data breaches; and increase the types of activities that can result in a civil or criminal penalty, the people who can be charged with a violation, and the governmental entities that can prosecute a violation of HIPAA.More specifics to come.