DNS is one of healthcare’s most visible control surfaces. Public DNS records can reveal patient portals, email systems, clinical applications, third-party services, abandoned infrastructure, and external dependencies before an attacker ever touches an internal system.
Authentic Web’s 2026 Healthcare DNS Security and Compliance Benchmark Report is the second edition of its healthcare DNS benchmark, following the 2024 study. The report analyzes 25 healthcare organizations, 9,372 domains, and more than 32,545 DNS records to show how DNS hygiene, DNSSEC adoption, and change governance are improving – and where persistent control gaps remain.
The report also explains how DNS governance connects to broader security and compliance expectations, including HIPAA, SOC 2, ISO 27001, NIST, and related security governance frameworks.
What the report covers
- DNS hygiene. Dangling CNAMEs, stale records, orphaned IPs, insecure redirects, lame delegations, forgotten subdomains, and other findings that can create takeover, hijacking, or exposure risk.
- DNSSEC and authentication controls. DNSSEC adoption, SPF and DMARC coverage, and related indicators of DNS and email-domain protection.
- Change governance. The ownership, workflow, approval, policy-enforcement, and audit-evidence controls needed to keep DNS risks from recurring.
- Compliance alignment. How DNS governance supports broader risk management, access control, monitoring, change control, and audit expectations under HIPAA, SOC 2, ISO 27001, NIST, and related frameworks.
- Year-over-year trends. What changed since Authentic Web’s previous healthcare DNS benchmark in 2024, including where healthcare organizations improved and where governance gaps continued to persist.
Why DNS security matters for healthcare organizations
Healthcare organizations operate sprawling external DNS footprints. Patient portals, telehealth platforms, affiliated clinics, acquired practices, email systems, marketing sites, and third-party vendors all add records over time. Without clear ownership and change governance, those records can become difficult to monitor, validate, or safely retire.
DNS hijacking and subdomain takeover
Abandoned records that still point to decommissioned services may be claimed by an attacker and used to host phishing pages or malicious content on a trusted healthcare domain.
DNS spoofing and cache-poisoning risk
Where DNSSEC is absent, organizations may lack cryptographic assurance that DNS responses have not been altered in transit.
Reconnaissance
Public DNS records can reveal hostnames, mail systems, patient-facing applications, cloud services, and third-party dependencies that attackers use to plan attacks.
Compliance and audit gaps
Weak DNS policy, unclear ownership, undocumented changes, and limited audit evidence can undermine the risk management, access control, change control, monitoring, and governance expectations found in HIPAA, SOC 2, ISO 27001, NIST, and related security standards.
Who should read this report
- CISOs and security leaders at hospitals, health systems, payers, and health technology companies
- Infrastructure, network, and DNS teams responsible for external DNS
- Digital operations, web, and brand governance teams responsible for patient-facing domains
- Compliance, risk, and audit teams preparing for HIPAA, SOC 2, ISO 27001, NIST, or related security assessments
- Vendors and partners that manage DNS, domains, or web infrastructure for healthcare clients
How to use the benchmark
- Compare your organization’s DNS hygiene, DNSSEC adoption, and change governance against the benchmark findings.
- Identify where stale records, insecure redirects, lame delegations, weak email-domain controls, or missing DNSSEC may create exposure.
- Use the findings to start a conversation with security, infrastructure, compliance, risk, audit, and digital operations stakeholders.
- Prioritize remediation based on exposure, operational impact, and governance maturity.
- Revisit the benchmark annually to track progress against healthcare peers.
Frequently asked questions
What is a DNS security benchmark report?
A DNS security benchmark report compares how a group of organizations manage externally visible DNS risks, including record hygiene, DNSSEC adoption, email-domain protection, and change governance. It helps security, infrastructure, compliance, and digital operations teams understand how their own practices compare with peer organizations.
Why is DNS security important in healthcare?
DNS is publicly visible and connects patient portals, email, clinical applications, telehealth platforms, and third-party services to the internet. Attackers use DNS records to identify targets and dependencies, and unmanaged records can be hijacked to run phishing, redirect traffic, or expose forgotten infrastructure. In healthcare, those risks can affect patient-facing systems, sensitive data, and care delivery.
Does DNS governance affect HIPAA, SOC 2, ISO 27001, and NIST alignment?
Yes. These frameworks and standards address risk management, access control, monitoring, change management, policy enforcement, evidence, and auditability in different ways. DNS is not always called out as a standalone category, but poor DNS hygiene, unclear ownership, weak change controls, and limited audit evidence can weaken the technical and administrative controls that support compliance and assurance efforts.
What is DNSSEC and do healthcare organizations need it?
DNSSEC, or DNS Security Extensions, adds cryptographic signatures to DNS records so resolvers can verify that DNS answers have not been altered. It helps protect against spoofing and cache-poisoning risks. The report looks at DNSSEC adoption across healthcare organizations and considers what that adoption says about broader DNS governance maturity.
How is DNS hijacking prevented?
DNS hijacking and related takeover risks are reduced through a combination of record cleanup, domain locking, provider control, role-based access, documented ownership, change approvals, monitoring, and audit logging. The report shows how consistently healthcare organizations appear to maintain those controls across their external DNS footprints.
Is the report free?
Yes. Use the download button on this page to get a complimentary copy of the 2026 Healthcare DNS Security and Compliance Benchmark Report.
How is the 2026 report different from the 2024 report?
The 2026 report is Authentic Web’s second healthcare DNS benchmark. It compares current findings against the 2024 baseline to show where healthcare organizations have improved and where DNS governance gaps continue to persist. The 2026 edition analyzes 25 healthcare organizations, 9,372 domains, and more than 32,545 DNS records, giving readers a broader view of DNS hygiene, DNSSEC adoption, email-domain protection, and change governance across the healthcare sector.