Security framework for cloud based electronic health record (EHR) system

Abstract

Health records are an integral aspect of any Hospital Management System. With newer innovations in technology, there has been a shift in the way of recording health information. Medical records which used to be managed using various paper charts have now become easier to organize and maintain, thereby increasing the efficiency of medical staff. The Electronic Health Records (EHR) System is becoming a high-tech medical management technology developed for the economic or emerging economic countries like India. In a national health system, the EHR integrates the Electronic Medical Records (EMR) in all collaborating hospitals through different networks. EHR gives healthcare professionals a way to share and manage patient data quickly and effectively. Due to the mass storage of confidential patient data, healthcare organizations are considered as one of the most targeted sectors by intruders. This paper proposes a security framework for EHR system, which takes into consideration the integrity, availability, and confidentiality of health records. The threats posed to the EHR system are modeled by STRIDE modeling tool, and the amount of risk is calculated using DREAD. The paper also suggests the security mechanism and countermeasures based on security standards, which can be utilized in an EHR environment. The paper shows that the utilization of the proposed methods effectively addresses security concerns such as breach of sensitive medical information.

Sec-Health: A Blockchain-Based Protocol for Securing Health Records

“…Ganiga et al [24] elaborated a healthcare security framework for cloud-based systems, which addresses confidentiality and access control by employing attribute-based encryption. However, it is assumed that the cloud will behave honestly by following the permissions that a patient assigns for collaborators.…”

“…Confidentiality and access control. Although some proposals adopt CP-ABE to fulfill confidentiality and access control (e.g., [24], [22], [26]), they use centralized servers to store health records and evaluate access permissions. We instead provide a two-layer security, wherein the first layer has a decentralized network, with no single points of failure, which stores records metadata encrypted with public keys, and the second consists of records encrypted with CP-ABE.…”

“…Several proposals lack schemes to address integrity of health records [26], [22], [6]. Other solutions (e.g., [24]) adopt a centralized cloud assuming that it will never alter or delete health records. To protect against unauthorized alteration, we store the record metadata (e.g., its hash value) in a blockchain, which is very hard to tamper with.…”

Electronic Medical Records and Machine Learning in Approaches to Drug Development

“…The reader is directed to Refs. [54][55][56], in which the current technologies and methods used for security measures on EMRs are reviewed.…”

A systematic mapping study of security, trust and privacy in clouds

“…Also, health records are crucial in any hospital system, but they are coming under increased attacks. These records contain private and sensitive patient information, and a breach in their confidentiality, integrity or privacy can lead to dire consequences on both the patients, caregivers, and the medical facilities, such as defamation, discrimination, lawsuits, and other stressful conditions [12]. If data is not stored securely in the cloud, it can be compromised, leading to severe consequences.…”