Vass Bednar is the executive director of McMaster University’s new master of public policy in digital society program Should personal health information be tethered to rewards and leveraged for advertising purposes? In October, Loblaw Cos. Ltd. unveiled a mobile application that refers shoppers to health services and ties loyalty points to wellness behaviours. Developed in a partnership with…
Category: Healthcare
B.C. ministry warned birth alerts ‘illegal and unconstitutional’ months before banning them
Bayleigh Marelj writes: Months before British Columbia officially ended the controversial practice of birth alerts, government lawyers advised the Ministry of Children and Family Development (MCFD) that the practice was “illegal and unconstitutional” and posed a “litigation risk,” according to records obtained by IndigiNews. When a social worker feels an expectant parent may put their…
OCR Releases Report Summarizing HIPAA Privacy and Security Compliance Failures
Joseph J. Lazzarotti and Maya Atrakchi of JacksonLewis write: In the final days of 2020, the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) at the U.S. Health and Human Service (HHS) released a HIPAA Audits Industry Report (“the Report”), that could be quite helpful to covered entities and business associates for tackling HIPAA compliance as we enter the new…
Singapore changes the rules and will now use COVID-19 contact-tracing app data in criminal cases
Is there anyone who didn’t see this coming? Simon Sharwood reports: The Singapore government has decided to use data gathered by its TraceTogether COVID-19-coronavirus contact-tracing app in criminal investigations. The nation’s enthusiasm for re-use of the info was yesterday revealed in parliament, after Deputy Speaker of the Christopher De Souza was asked if the data…