Healthcare (Jul 2020)

Enhancing Privacy and Data Security across Healthcare Applications Using Blockchain and Distributed Ledger Concepts

  • Haibing Liu,
  • Rubén González Crespo,
  • Oscar Sanjuán Martínez

DOI
https://doi.org/10.3390/healthcare8030243
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 8, no. 3
p. 243

Abstract

Read online

Nowadays, blockchain is developing as a secure and trustworthy platform for secure information sharing in areas of application like banking, supply chain management, food industry, energy, the Internet, and medical services. Besides, the blockchain can be described in a decentralized manner as an immutable ledger for recording data entries. Furthermore, this new technology has been developed to interrupt a variety of data-driven fields, including the health sector. However, blockchain refers to the distributed ledger technology, which constitutes an innovation in the information recording and sharing without a trusted third party. In this paper, blockchain and Distributed Ledger-based Improved Biomedical Security system (BDL-IBS) has been proposed to enhance the privacy and data security across healthcare applications. Further, our goal is to make it possible for patients to use the data to support their care and to provide strong consent systems for sharing data among different organizations and applications, since this includes managing and accessing a high amount of medical information, and this technology can maintain data to ensure reliability. Finally, results show that new blockchain-based digital platforms allow for fast, easy, and seamless interactions between data suppliers to enhance privacy and data security, including for patients themselves.

Keywords