Amalgamation of Cryptography and Steganography for Securing the Healthcare Data Security

Healthcare data breaches remain a prominent threat to patients’ privacy as well as an institution's integrity. Traditional forms of encryption no longer suffice as cyberattacks develop into sophisticated attacks, and this article explores the concept of synergizing cryptographic algorithms with steganographic methods to improve health care data safety. Surveyed 47 hospitals that have adopted this hybrid approach based on AES-256 encryption and used LSB steganography in the medical imaging file. Results have been shown to achieve a 94% reduction in successful unauthorized access attempts when compared to single-layer security systems. Data retrieval efficiency is also preserved with only a 2.3% increase in processing overhead. Dual-layer protection has also been effective in man-in-the-middle attacks since no successful breach was detected within six months of testing. This research established that the fusion of cryptography and steganography would provide an appropriate security framework for healthcare data that would increase security without significant overhead on system performance. These results are important in ensuring that the infrastructure of health organizations is strengthened as much as possible while operational efficiency is also achieved.