Big Data Security in Healthcare: Survey on Frameworks and Algorithms

Healthcare data is increasingly being digitized today and the data collected today coming in from all modern devices, has reached a significant volume all over the world. In the US, UK and other European countries, healthcare data needs to be secured and Patient Health Records (PHR) need to be protected so that re-identification of patients cannot be done from basic information. Privacy of healthcare is an important aspect governed by Healthcare Acts (e.g. HIPAA) and hence the data needs to be secured from falling into the wrong hands or from being breached by malicious insiders. It is important to secure existing healthcare big data environments due to increasing threats of breaches and leaks from confidential data and increased adoption of cloud technologies. In this paper the current healthcare security scenario in big data environments has been summarized along with challenges faced and security issues that need attention. Some existing approaches have been described to illustrate current and standard directions to solving the issues. Since healthcare governance in the US has a strong focus on security and privacy as opposed to other countries on this day, the paper focuses on Acts and privacy practices in the US context.