One credit card number costs mere pennies on the black market, but one medical record can be worth about $100, making it a much more appealing target, he said.
In August, after a major U.S. hospital operator was breached and the personal information of 4.5 million patients was stolen, the FBI cautioned health-care companies to ramp up their security measures. But hospitals often lack the expertise to take such steps, McCormack said.
"Medical information is being dumped in the cloud and being accessed by doctors who don't have the first clue about security," he said. "It's an afterthought.