Salesforce Marketing Cloud is not HIPAA compliant for HIPAA Covered Entities or Business Associates because Salesforce Marketing Cloud is not offered as a HIPAA-covered service for electronic protected health information and a HIPAA Business Associate Agreement is not available for Salesforce Marketing Cloud use involving protected health information.
HIPAA compliance for a cloud service depends on both contract and controls. When a vendor creates, receives, maintains, or transmits electronic protected health information on behalf of a HIPAA Covered Entity or Business Associate, HIPAA requires a written agreement that describes permitted uses and disclosures, requires safeguards aligned to the HIPAA Security Rule, and establishes breach reporting obligations under the HIPAA Breach Notification Rule. Without a HIPAA Business Associate Agreement that covers the specific service, the service cannot be used to handle protected health information.
Salesforce offers HIPAA contracting for certain Salesforce products through a Business Associate Agreement or Business Associate Addendum, with use limited to the services designated as HIPAA eligible and configured for regulated data. That does not extend to Salesforce Marketing Cloud for protected health information workflows. Organizations should distinguish between Salesforce products that can be placed under a HIPAA Business Associate Agreement and Salesforce Marketing Cloud, which is positioned for marketing automation rather than protected health information processing.
Salesforce Marketing Cloud features can introduce protected health information through contact attributes, audience segmentation fields, preference centers, landing pages, forms, automation rules, dynamic content, and tracking parameters. Even limited data elements can become protected health information when they identify an individual and connect the individual to healthcare services, treatment status, or payment context. Campaign reporting and analytics can also replicate identifiers and engagement data across dashboards, exports, and integrated systems.
Salesforce Marketing Cloud can be used by healthcare organizations only for communications and data sets that do not include protected health information and do not connect identifiable individuals to healthcare treatment or payment. When a use case requires patient-specific outreach using protected health information, select a platform that will execute a HIPAA Business Associate Agreement for the service in scope and that supports controlled access, audit controls, transmission security, and breach response procedures aligned to HIPAA requirements.