Healthcare Industry Pushes Biometric Digital ID Infrastructure In Response To Data Breaches & AI

Despite the digitization of the healthcare industry leading to perpetual data breaches which occasionally compromise biometric identification information, the response appears to be “a broader push toward identity-assured digital healthcare ecosystems” instead of reverting back to analog information management.

“Healthcare organizations are rapidly strengthening digital identity infrastructure as interoperability mandates, patient portal fraud and AI-driven impersonation risks push the sector toward higher-assurance verification across clinical, administrative and virtual care systems,” Biometric Update said Wednesday. “The emergence of real-time human verification reflects growing concern that generative AI could undermine trust in telehealth, remote administration and virtual clinical workflows.”

Both medical industry employees and patients alike are facing a future where digital biometric identification is increasingly necessary for their authentication due to the introduction of medical smartphone apps and web-based portals, telehealth services and access to digitized medical records.

“The shift reflects a broader transformation in digital health, where identity is increasingly treated as core infrastructure underpinning patient access, provider credentialing, data exchange and trusted virtual interactions,” Biometric Update said. “At the Reuters Digital Health Summit, a new identity network will be unveiled. The launch comes as the market moves at pace toward stronger identity assurance, from ID.me’s work with Medicaid agencies to Zoom and Tools for Humanity’s new real‑time human verification features. It reflects a sector‑wide push to secure patient access, provider credentials and virtual care environments.”

The digitization of the healthcare industry began over two decades ago. Since then, cybersecurity vulnerabilities have continued to lead to data breaches while reliance on computer systems only increased.

“During his January 20, 2004, State of the Union Address, President Bush pledged that every patient will have an electronic patient record in 10 years, and, on April 27, 2004, he signed an executive order 13335 (EO) announcing his commitment to the promotion of health information technology to lower costs, reduce medical errors, improve the quality of care and provide better information for patients and physicians. In particular, he called for widespread adoption of electronic health records and for health information to follow patients through their care in a seamless and secure manner,” the Duane Morris Institute said in 2009.

While web-based access to medical databases has increased the speed and efficiency of information management, it has created the problem of unauthorized access through cyberattacks. The reaction has not been to reduce reliance on digital infrastructure however, reverting back to paper records. Instead, an increased focus on digital biometric identification has been prescribed as the solution.

One system that is being adopted comes from the company 1Kosmos. Its “verification process uses government‑issued document checks, biometric matching and liveness detection to confirm a patient’s identity before they access or recover an account,” Biometric Update said.

“Our integration with MyChart makes it significantly easier for organizations to verify patient identities, reduce fraud risk, and protect sensitive health data, without disrupting the patient experience,” Huzela Olia, COO of 1Kosmos said.

The advancement of artificial intelligence has also impacted medical information security. Telehealth services face the prospect of advanced AI avatars impersonating patients. While the problem centers around AI and telehealth, the solution being developed centers around more digital identification infrastructure.

“Generative AI is accelerating impersonation‑driven fraud, with Deloitte projecting U.S. losses to jump from $12.3 billion in 2023 to $40 billion by 2027. Healthcare organizations that already operate in high risk, high sensitivity environments face growing exposure as deepfakes make it easier to mimic patients, clinicians and administrators,” Biometric Update said. “Zoom is responding by partnering with Tools for Humanity to integrate World ID Deep Face into Zoom Meetings, enabling real‑time verification that participants are genuine humans. This could strengthen protection during telehealth consultations, clinical decision‑making and sensitive patient‑identity workflows in healthcare.”

Of note is a principle that has been with technology from the dawn of human advancement – that the sword evolves with the shield. While countermeasures can be developed, the technology to attack will evolve as well, driving the countermeasures to their next stage in a perpetual cycle.

“We ask how the offense-defense balance scales, meaning how it changes as investments into a conflict increase. To do so we offer a general formalization of the offense-defense balance in terms of contest success functions. Simple models of ground invasions and cyberattacks that exploit software vulnerabilities suggest that, in both cases, growth in investments will favor offense when investment levels are sufficiently low and favor defense when they are sufficiently high. We refer to this phenomenon as offensive-then-defensive scaling or OD-scaling. Such scaling effects may help us understand the security implications of applications of artificial intelligence that in essence scale up existing capabilities,” a 2019 research paper by Ben Garfinkel and Allan Dafoe at the Future of Humanity Institute of the University of Oxford said.

Cybersecurity is a field of ongoing change, with a never-ending need for new developments to counter new vulnerabilities. With new risks to digitized medical data, new solutions will be rolled out. These solutions will not however be an end-all-be-all.

It is highly unlikely that any level of severity or regularity of data breaches will push the medical industry back toward paper records due to the efficiency gains of digital technology. Instead, the digital surveillance grid will only grow, far beyond the levels of its current expansion.

“The Global Biometrics As A Service (BaaS) in Healthcare Market is growing rapidly. It is expected to reach $ 4492.7 million by 2034,” Market.us Media said in 2025.