Secure Audit in Support of an Adrenal Cancer Registry

Anthony Stell, Vedant Chauhan, Richard Sinnott

2020

Abstract

This paper describes the use of blockchain technology to ensure the integrity of data logs for a clinical registry, providing a technological means for a secure audit of that registry. The characteristics of a secure audit – tamper-resistance, verifiability, searchability and privacy – are described in their application to this registry, then an evaluation is performed detailing the use of blockchain to achieve these audit goals. The clinical registry tested – supporting ENSAT (the European Network for the Study of Adrenal Tumors) – is a production repository of clinical, phenotypic and genetic information about patients with adrenal cancer, a rare but often serious condition that affects approximately 1 in 600,000 of the world population. The registry is implemented using a standard n-tier web application, with a MySQL database back-end, and Java/JSP business logic and user interface. The information contributing to the full audit of data and usage of the registry, is captured in the application log-files, which are stored in two “mirrored” formats: ASCII text files compiled through the Java log4j project and in a MongoDB NoSQL database. Following a discussion of the relevant supporting features, the fully implemented solution – a private blockchain known as “ensatChain” – is evaluated for overall security, using the Microsoft “STRIDE” threat model.

Paper Citation

in Harvard Style

Stell A., Chauhan V. and Sinnott R. (2020). Secure Audit in Support of an Adrenal Cancer Registry. In Proceedings of the 13th International Joint Conference on Biomedical Engineering Systems and Technologies (BIOSTEC 2020) - Volume 5: HEALTHINF; ISBN 978-989-758-398-8, SciTePress, pages 237-248. DOI: 10.5220/0009160402370248

in Bibtex Style

@conference{healthinf20,
author={Anthony Stell and Vedant Chauhan and Richard Sinnott},
title={Secure Audit in Support of an Adrenal Cancer Registry},
booktitle={Proceedings of the 13th International Joint Conference on Biomedical Engineering Systems and Technologies (BIOSTEC 2020) - Volume 5: HEALTHINF},
year={2020},
pages={237-248},
publisher={SciTePress},
organization={INSTICC},
doi={10.5220/0009160402370248},
isbn={978-989-758-398-8},
}

in EndNote Style

TY - CONF

JO - Proceedings of the 13th International Joint Conference on Biomedical Engineering Systems and Technologies (BIOSTEC 2020) - Volume 5: HEALTHINF
TI - Secure Audit in Support of an Adrenal Cancer Registry
SN - 978-989-758-398-8
AU - Stell A.
AU - Chauhan V.
AU - Sinnott R.
PY - 2020
SP - 237
EP - 248
DO - 10.5220/0009160402370248
PB - SciTePress