Internet privacy — Working to proactively prevent problems related to the use of search engines is preferable to trying to clean up privacy problems after the fact. Here are some tips and resources for enhancing search engine privacy.
Identity theft — The World Privacy Forum submitted comments in response to the Federal Trade Commission’s request for feedback on its upcoming identity theft survey. The FTC identity theft survey is one of the most quoted surveys on the subject. The World Privacy Forum requested changes and clarifications to the survey, including adding questions about security breach notices and clarifying existing questions about medical identity theft, among other issues.
Medical privacy — The World Privacy Forum filed comments with Health and Human Services this week asking the agency to protect patient choice and privacy. The World Privacy Forum asked that patients continue to be able to receive accounting of disclosures under HIPAA, and asked that this important patient right under HIPAA not be removed or weakened. The World Privacy Forum also asked HHS to review how patients’ records can be amended under HIPAA, and recommended that in light of the coming National Health Information Network, that changes to enhance patient choice may be needed in this area.
Medical privacy — The World Privacy Forum testified before the National Committee on Vital Health Statistics in August regarding the importance of patient choice in the area of Electronic Health Records. The testimony stressed the importance of building security, patient privacy, and choice into EHRs and any form of the proposed National Health Information Network (NHIN).
The World Privacy Forum has been particularly interested in developments related to EHRs and the NHIN. Given the impetus of the 2004 Executive Order [1] mandating forward movement in these areas, and the broad impact digitized medical records will potentially have on patients and on the healthcare sector, the World Privacy Forum believes that the decisions this Committee and others shaping these efforts arrive at will be of lasting importance. Given the transition of many parts of our society from analog to digital, it is crucial to ask what this digitization will look like and to carefully examine and discuss what form EHRs and related systems should take in regards to patient choice, privacy, and security.