Cyber Security and Privacy in the Digital Health Age
Channel: CPI Waterloo
Date: 2023-06-07

The advancement of big data (e.g., wearables, social media data, mobile health) into mainstream public health and healthcare delivery has increased our ability to monitor population-level changes in near real-time, providing our society with advanced warnings for infectious diseases (GPHIN - Global Public Health Intelligence Network), channels for evaluating the impact of policy changes (Google Social Mobility), and mechanisms for controlling the progression of pandemics (COVID Alert). As a society, however, we are still not certain about the best practices on how to navigate the use of big data in public health, which consequently leads to public concerns about the privacy and security of their data. This paper presents a perspective on cybersecurity and privacy challenges and technologies supporting digital health and big data use in public health. Recent cloud technology and cybersecurity advancements can provide the necessary safeguards for digital health care. However, as a country, we still need a unified front guiding the implementation of such systems in Public Health. The authors will discuss the ideal approach for ensuring that Canada’s public health ecosystem is empowered big data while still ensuring that Canadians’ privacy and data security. Public Health is a complex and dynamic ecosystem that requires rapid surveillance programs, which was demonstrated by the COVID-19 pandemics and this article will seed the implementation of a Canada-wide strategy for using big data from digital health in Public Health initiatives.