de-identification

Andy Oram

The previous part of this article laid down a basic premise that the purpose of security isto protect people, not computer systems or data. Let’s continue our exploration of internal threats. This is a policy issue that calls for involvement by a wide range of actors throughout society, of course. Policy-makers have apparently already decided that it is socially beneficial–or at least the most feasible course economically–for clinicians to share data with partners helping them with treatment, operations, or payment. There are even rules now requiring those partners to protect the data. Policy-makers have further decided that de-identified data sharing is beneficial to help researchers and even companies using it to sell more treatments. 

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