Automating Cloud Security to Protect Patient Privacy with Chris Bowen, Founder and CISO of ClearDATA

[00:00:01] This podcast is produced by Outcomes Rocket, your healthcare exclusive digital marketing agency. Outcomes Rocket exists to help healthcare organizations like yours to maximize their impact and accelerate growth. Visit outcomesrocket.com or text us at 312-224-9945.

[00:00:29] Hey everyone, welcome back to the Outcomes Rocket, Founder Stories here in Health Las Vegas. Today I have the privilege of having Chris Bowen with us. He is the founder and CISO of ClearDATA. Chris, thanks for joining us. Thanks all, I'm honored to be here. It's a pleasure. What brings you to health? Have you been here before? Why are you here? I remember those days of HEMS and it was a lot more crowded here. We love health because it's a little bit more intimate.

[00:00:59] We can talk like we are right now without being trampled. We can talk about some of the solutions. We've got a great series of speakers that are coming out in this expo, if you will. So yeah, I love health. It's great. The reason I'm here was because MedCity News called me and said, hey, we need to have you on a panel. Oh, that was this morning. On a bright early Sunday morning in Vegas. You can imagine it was standing room only. I love it. I love it.

[00:01:28] Well, you're moving and shaking in the space in an area that really, I think, is ripe with opportunities, but not moving as fast as it could. And that's the cloud. So tell us a little bit about what you do and what the company does, ClearData, and what the big opportunity is and the challenges associated with it. We've been doing this since meaningful use. And when we saw some of our customers, I had a previous startup at the time.

[00:01:55] When we saw some of the challenges that they had with diligencing vendors, protecting patient data, those were the days where they would email terabyte of spreadsheets with patient data in it. And you would just be like, oh my gosh. So I was working with a large system at the time. And I said, I went to the chief legal officer and I said, hey, what would happen?

[00:02:20] What would you think if we created a company that did nothing but focus on protecting patient data? That's the sole focus. Well, they're still a customer today. One of the biggest of the big at this point. And again, our mission is all about protecting that patient data. So we'll do it in a way that's innovative, that leverages other customers with each other.

[00:02:43] For example, if we have one health system that has an issue over here, we'll deploy countermeasures across the entire fleet of our customer base. So they don't have to worry about it. And a lot of times we do that faster than the FBI can do it, faster than MITRE can do it, because we're seeing it real time. And so the other thing that we do is manage and operate the cloud. And really, it's all about the patient data. I think it's great. And we all know that in this environment, patient data is at risk.

[00:03:13] And health care is one of the biggest targets for some of these bad actors. So it's really great to hear the network that you and the company are creating. It's for everybody listening and watching. What's been one of the biggest things that you guys have been able to achieve this year? And what is 2025 looking like for y'all? 2025, we're excited about 2025.

[00:03:36] Innovating on our platform, adding more features that allow our customers to understand their risk profile in the cloud. As we know, when someone spins up a cloud, that's just the beginning. And then you have to maintain the cloud. You have to maintain the age of the assets that you're using. You have to make sure that you're doing so many things that it's very hard to go to the cloud. It's difficult. And so we're preparing software that will make that easier for our customers.

[00:04:07] At a snapshot, hey, tell me how I'm doing and where am I vulnerable? How do I fix that? Yeah. We're deploying some AI that's going to help with some of that as well. Basic directions on, hey, you just lit up a Lambda function, for example, a compute function. And it's a little bit misconfigured. We're going to go ahead and fix that for you automatically so you don't have to worry about it. That's great. And what do you see is, for customers in the healthcare space, one of the biggest obstacles to adoption of the cloud?

[00:04:37] Talent. Talent. We've heard about it at the Health Sector Cyber Council Working Group. We hear about it from our HR recruiters. We see our people get poached from continuously. Hey, you've got some skills. We're going to take you. We're going to throw a bunch of money at you. And so when you think about a provider and how much money they don't have, people think they have a lot of money, but the margins are very thin. Keeping the talent is a big challenge. That's a big hurdle.

[00:05:06] And then deploying your cloud correctly, architecting it correctly, it's a big deal. It's tough. And so now here comes clear data with the tools, resources, and people to really help resolve that problem and help health systems take advantage of the cloud. Yeah, absolutely. Been doing it for a long time. I remember the days where we had to say, cloud's the next big thing. We need to get you onto the cloud.

[00:05:34] And they would be like, we're going to go into our basement data center. We're going to stay the course on that. And now it's the critical mass is happening. Those that have had some of the biggest breaches in the world at this point, the solution that they're coming to is the cloud. Get it out of the data center. Get rid of that end of life, which is such a huge threat. And just go into a greenfield environment that allows you to start over. That's awesome, Chris.

[00:06:00] Well, look, we're lucky to have technologists like you and companies like yours to help us bridge that gap and get to the cloud to prevent all of these issues from happening. For anybody listening and watching today, what would you leave them with a closing thought? And then where's the best place they could learn more about you and the company? Chris Bowen on my LinkedIn. I live in Scottsdale, Arizona. So type that in. You'll find more about me. The company itself, you can come and find us at cleardata.com. Amazing.

[00:06:30] Quick and easy, folks. Check out the show notes of this podcast below and get in touch. Don't wait until it's an emergency. The best thing you could do today is take advantage of getting on the phone, reaching out to these guys via email, because that's how you're going to make a difference with your cloud infrastructure. Chris, I really can't thank you enough for being here. This is a great opportunity to meet you. Thanks a lot, Saul. It's a pleasure.

[00:07:04] This podcast is produced by Outcomes Rocket, your healthcare-exclusive digital marketing. Outcomes Rocket exists to help healthcare organizations like yours to maximize their impact and accelerate growth. Visit OutcomesRocket.com or text us at 312-224-9945. Uh-bye.