Henry Schein Practice Solutions, Inc. To Pay $250,000 Under Final FTC Order

On May 20, the FTC approved its final order resolving its Complaint against Henry Schein Practice Solutions, Inc. ("Schein"), which came after the expiration of a public comment period.  Schein is a provider of office management software for dental practices. 

The FTC's Complaint alleged that Schein misrepresented the encryption capabilities of its Dentrix G5 software in its marketing materials to dentists over a period of two years.  Specifically, Schein is alleged to have marketed its software as providing industry-standard encryption sufficient to meet certain HIPAA regulatory obligations.  According to the FTC, the software actually used a less complex data masking process to protect personal information, which was in fact below industry-standard.  Encryption methods can vary in complexity across different forms of media and data.  In an effort to provide an encryption benchmark, the National Institute of Standards and Technology publishes guidance regarding