The Data Cave Advantage, Part 1
April 6, 2012 by Kara Manon · Leave a Comment
Here are just a few of the things that we think make Data Cave stand out in the crowd.
Purpose-built: If you’ve seen our facility, then you know, it was meant to be a data center. Many people who see the building say it looks like a prison, and they aren’t wrong. The building is nondescript and menacing, as it should be. We want to keep the general public out of the facility for the security of our customers. No one should be around the building that isn’t employed by or working with Data Cave. Our customers feel safe when they visit and know their equipment is safe. Not only that, but because we custom-built the facility, we purposely installed 12-inch thick block around the perimeter of the data center. The rebar that continues through the middle of each block is nearly an inch thick and the blocks are filled with concrete. The rebar continues down into the ground and up into the roof. Too many data centers out there were retrofitted into existing buildings and don’t provide the safety and privacy that we believe a data center should have in order to give customers maximum protection.
Privately Owned & Operated: This speaks for itself. We own the land and the building. There are no liens on the property and we don’t have anyone to answer to, including a board of directors. A lot of data centers lease space which could potentially cause future problems when lease terms end. We also have continuity here. The same people who built Data Cave are still around today. Our facility manager has been working at Data Cave since the beginning and helped actually build Data Cave.
The Roof: We’ve blogged about this before but it’s pretty impressive so we’ll say it again: Our roof weighs approximately 4.5 MILLION pounds. This is fairly jaw dropping. As you can see from the above photo, no equipment sits on the roof and we have no roof access. We built Data Cave this way to mitigate any potential leaks that could occur. The rebar mentioned earlier actually helps hold the roof down in the event of high winds or tornadoes. You can read more here.
Data Suites: Instead of the traditional data center with one big room where customers have to cage their equipment, Data Cave is split into individual 1,300-square-feet data suites. We chose that size to minimize hotspots and provide a higher level of privacy and security for customers. This layout allows one client to lease a suite which only they have access to, at any time. One of our data suite customers must comply with HIPAA and HITECH acts, which means everyone going in and out of the suite is monitored. We send the customer a report at the end of each month listing who has been in the area. That’s just one of the suites that our staff stays out of unless absolutely necessary. This setup really benefits companies needing to comply with certain regulations.
Come see for yourself the advantages of choosing Data Cave. Call us at 866.514.2283.
Data Centers and HIPAA Compliance
October 11, 2011 by Kara Manon · Leave a Comment
There have been questions about what role a data center plays when it comes to HIPAA. We want to address what requirements and obligations data centers have when working with clients in the healthcare industry.
First of all, what is HIPAA? The acronym stands for the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, enacted to protect the health information of patients. When you visit a doctor’s office or the emergency room at your local hospital, all the people seeing your medical history have signed some sheet of paper, promising to keep your information private. This means to disclose healthcare information, they must have your permission (or authorization from the proper authorities in cases of child abuse, etc.). HIPAA also covers how physical and electronic data is handled and secured. Healthcare entities must backup their data and have a disaster recovery plan in place. This is where data centers come in.
The Health Information and Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act was enacted on February 17, 2009. This Act requires covered entities to disclose breaches in Protected Health Information (PHI). The covered entities and their business associates that “access, maintain, retain, modify, record, store, destroy, or otherwise hold, use, or disclose unsecured PHI” are required to notify the Department of Health and Human Services or any breaches. The business associates must notify the covered entity of a breach who in turn notifies the individuals involved (patients) and the HHS if more than 500 individuals were affected. From the statement above, data centers like Data Cave, would be considered a business associate.
The problem is there is much to speculate on what this actually means. Some data centers use HIPAA compliance as a marketing tool. Let me make something clear, there is no certification for HIPAA. A data center can be HIPAA compliant, which is what we at Data Cave consider ourselves. Some pay an outside source to come in, look around, and put their stamp of approval on the facility. For Data Cave, meeting HIPAA compliance means limiting people with access to equipment, including our own staff. This also means notifying the proper channels when someone has been near a healthcare entity’s equipment. With most healthcare companies, they are going to want to manage their own equipment, which means our staff wouldn’t need to touch it anyway. However, for a data center doing managed services, facility staff would be responsible. In that case the facility would enter into an agreement with the customer to maintain confidentiality. In the event of a breach, whether virtual or physical, a data center would notify the customer (the covered entity) who would, in turn, notify the HHS if applicable.
In other words, no one can claim HIPAA certification. To take it a step further, the essence of a data center is to be secure; so in that case, aren’t we all HIPAA compliant?
To find out more about Data Cave and HIPAA compliance, call us at 866-514-2283 or Contact Us via our website.