Two University of Arizona grads are working to educate healthcare providers to stop hackers from taking control of medical devices in peoples' bodies.
Dr. Christian Dameff and Dr. Jeff Tully recently participated in the first CyberMed Summit, which simulated what would happen if a hospital or a patient had its devices or their pacemaker or insulin pump hacked remotely.
The result: hospitals and doctors are not prepared for a cyber attack.
Research has shown hackers could give you too much medication or cause your pacemaker to stop working, but doctors say the threat is much larger than individual patients being attacked.
Former Vice President Dick Cheney had a pacemaker put in, but a couple years ago he had the wireless capabilities disabled to prevent possible assassination by hackers.
A recent hack in Great Britain called the "WannaCry" hack left more than 20 hospitals with a virus that stopped them from being able to access devices connected to the internet.
Doctor Dameff says he does not want cyber security concerns to scare patients away from getting care they need.
Patients can make changes to their care if they're concerned--it all starts with a conversation with your doctor.
