While mHealth has the potential to increase healthcare quality, expand access to services, reduce costs, and improve personal wellness and public health, such benefits may not be fully realized unless greater privacy and security measures are implemented, according to a new paper published in the June issue of Computer.

Professors David Kotz (Dartmouth), Carl A. Gunter (University of Illinois), Santosh Kumar (University of Memphis), and Jonathan P. Weiner (Johns Hopkins), in their paper  (Privacy and Security in Mobile Health: A Research Agenda) challenge the research community to tackle several critical challenges related to security and privacy in mHealth: data sharing and consent management; access control and authentication; confidentiality and anonymity; mHealth smartphone apps; policies and compliance; accuracy and data provenance; and security technology.

With 45 percent of Americans facing chronic disease, which accounts for 75 percent of the annual $2.6+ trillion spent on healthcare, and many developed countries facing aging populations, mobile technology can serve as a great resource to help address these problems – provided mHealth companies and other stakeholders are able to meet the privacy and security challenges associated with these technologies.

For additional information contact Professor David Kotz, the Champion International Professor in the Department of Computer Science at Dartmouth College.

The article can be found in the June issue of Computer.