Secure data sharing and collaboration in healthcare analytics

The rapid development of big data in infrastructure and methodology has been reshaping the healthcare ecosystem. Massive healthcare data are generated from various resources, stored in databases or electronic health records, and shared among different stakeholders in research collaboration. The sharing of digitalized data is often convenient and lower-cost. However, security problems emerge as an important concern in healthcare analytics, including the loss of data authenticity, privacy disclosure, and compromising of informed consent. Many methods and algorithms have been proposed to improve the security of data sharing, whereas broadly accepted guidelines are still on the way. This chapter starts with a brief introduction to the concept of big data and modern healthcare applications to highlight the essentials of safe data sharing. The possible loopholes and potential threats are analyzed in detail to disclose the open challenges. The existing measures, algorithms, and relative policy are summarized to provide a panoramic view of the state of the art. Finally, the current trends and future directions are analyzed. This chapter provides a comprehensive overview for researchers and a reference for clinical practitioners and policymakers.