Behavior-based access control for distributed healthcare systems

Abstract

Sensitivity of clinical data and strict rules regarding data sharing have caused privacy and security to be critical requirements for using patient profiles in distributed healthcare systems. The amalgamation of new information technology with traditional healthcare workflows for sharing patient pr ofiles has made the whole system vulnerable to privacy and security breaches. Standardization organizations are developing specifications to satisfy the required privacy and security requirements. In this paper we present a novel access control model compliant with healthcare standards based on a framework designed for data and service interoperability in the healthcare domain. The proposed model for customizable access control captures the dynamic behavior of the user and determines access rights accordingly. The model is generic and flexible in the sense that an access control engine dynamically receives security effective parameters from the subject user, and identifies the privilege level in accessing data using different specialized components within the engine. Standard data representation formats and ontologies are used to make the model compatible with different healthcare systems. The access control engine employs an approach to follow the user's behavior and navigates among engine components to provide the user's privilege to access a resource. A simulation environment is implemented to evaluate and test the proposed model.