NHS Digital plans to open up patient data: but at what costs to privacy?
No. 19: Bringing you the news that matters in video privacy and security
A note from our Editor
Hi all,
This week's articles focus on the latest news regarding the protection of personal data; including NHS Digital's plans for opening up patient data. This has attracted lots of criticism due to the lack of awareness surrounding their plans and wider privacy concerns regarding the sharing of sensitive medical data with third parties, but could a centralised medical database be a good idea if it is setup securely with privacy in mind from the beginning?
The privacy shield surrounding personal data is also being threatened in schools and pubs - including via cloud services in the US, in education - as schools in Kent close thanks to a data breach, and via pubs, whose apps seem to be collecting more data than we think.
In wider Europe, Rome is taking a more positive approach to data protection, by ensuring that none of the images that are captured as part of their trial of smart city intelligent vision sensors will be stored, with processing carried out on the image sensor itself (vs in the cloud).
As always, please let me know if you have any feedback on any of the articles or want to see any other topics covered.
Emma
News
NHS Digital: what's happening with our data?
NHS Digital is planning to create a central NHS database, collecting GPs records of patient data. However, many have concerns of the implications of handing such data over, as the data is to be indirectly sold to third party corporations. Furthermore, it will not necessarily be fully anonymous.
Full Fact: What's happening with your NHS data?
The Guardian: NHS is giving away your data - As GPs, we are fighting back
The Guardian: GPs warn over plans to share patient data with third parties
Rome trials smart city intelligent vision sensors
In an attempt to reduce traffic, optimise public transport and pedestrian safety, Rome is trialling smart city intelligent vision sensors. No images are stored and nor do they leave the sensor, so they very much comply with privacy regulations.
SmartCities World: Rome conducts smart city trial of intelligent vision sensors
Privacy concerns and ransomware in the US
After so many cyber attacks in the US, including on federal agencies and the colonial pipeline; the US has decided to raise ransomware to a similar status to that of terrorism.
Meanwhile, US cloud services such as Amazon and Microsoft are under investigation by the EU privacy watchdog to ensure citizens' personal data is being properly protected.
IT Pro: US to give ransomware "terrorism" status
Computer Weekly: EU privacy chief investigation of US cloud services
Schools closed after they suffer a data breach
Two schools in Kent have been shut down after hackers have broken into their servers and stolen and encrypted pupil information. Staff are unsure of what information exactly they had access to. Furthermore, it seems that hackers were not adverse to joining online Google classrooms either, as it so happened to the Victorian Department of Education.
BBC News: Skinners' Kent schools closed after data breach
The Age: Remote learning security concern after online classrooms are breached
Pub apps are collecting more data than you think
Pub spending is up 7% in comparison to the same week in 2019, despite the somewhat arduous journey to order a pint through an app. But what are these apps actually collecting, and how private is our information?
Wired: All those pub apps you've downloaded are a privacy nightmare
AI Snippet of the Week
What are adversarial attacks and how are they threatening machine learning?
Adversarial attacks on machine learning are attempts to fool models with deceptive and false data, commonly used in a bid to corrupt a model. With the rise in AI, there is the inevitable rise in these attacks - but how can they be prevented?
Venture Beat: Adversarial attacks in machine learning - what they are and how to stop them
Policy Updates
Navigating the new SCCs and international data transfers
The final version of the new standard contractual clauses was published on 4th June 2021. Here is some advice for businesses on how to tackle the new SCCs and international data transfers.
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