To be pedantic, HIPAA was signed into law in 1996. Obama obviously had nothing to do with that. Technically the HITECH act was signed into law by Obama, in Feb 2009. But that was only a few weeks after he took office.<p>The Affortable Care Act <i>is</i> largely thanks to Obama. And it did add new regulations related to HIPAA and HITECH. But the core principals that you mentioned were already tehre.