HIPAA, or the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, is a United States law enacted in 1996 to protect the privacy and security of individuals' health information. It sets national standards for how healthcare providers, insurers, and related organizations handle and share personal health data. HIPAA aims to prevent unauthorized access to sensitive medical information and gives patients rights over their health records. However, its protections do not always extend to all types of health-related data, such as neural information collected in some research settings.