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August 10, 2021
IDENTOS Inc.’s Digital Identity Wallet gets closer to supporting all ages with new delegation feature
Toronto, ON – August 10th 2021
IDENTOS (“IDENTOS Inc.”), a leader in digital identity and access management, announces information delegation technology, a new product feature, first being implemented in a new health access platform at BC Children’s Hospital (BCCH) - now available to all customers.
Today, people have multiple digital identities, or credentials, that are ultimately held by a digital service. In fact, an individual has 100 digital credentials on average and as a result, the online login experience is often fatiguing.
Organizations are realizing that managing identities may not be as valuable as they once believed. It presents ongoing identity and access complexities as organizations look to integrate services and data inside and outside their walls, as well as with key trusted partners. The evolution away from this model has already begun with digital identity wallets, such as the one developed by IDENTOS.
However, dependents such as minors or seniors who need support in understanding how to best manage their digital identity and personal information don’t currently have a means to easily or regularly assent or consent to delegate authorization to a trusted guardian to act on their behalf.
As the IDENTOS Digital Identity Wallet matures, the company has recognized the need to accommodate citizens of all ages with delegation.
Why support information delegation?
As part of the TrustSphere project, a new health data access platform at BC Children's Hospital, IDENTOS has already begun using this technology to deliver secure, delegated access to guardians and clinicians -- achieving efficient data sharing and improving the care of pediatric patients.
With the identity wallet’s new delegation feature, a guardian can easily accept the authority in co-managing their dependents personal information at a granular level. They can also grant or revoke access to sharing data with other services.
What are the alternatives?
Currently, there isn’t a robust digital identity product in the market to help solve for delegation of personal information. The most common alternatives take an all-or-nothing approach which may still require manual processing. This is prone to error and can lead to complexity, delay and insecure methods of data transfer. The digital solutions that exist to accommodate consent for data from minors are designed mostly to assess the capacity for consent.
Benefits of information delegation
Patients who are dependants can:
-Share their health information with organizations that are working to improve their health and provide treatment options for care
Healthcare organizations can:
-Ensure patients can get critical and immediate treatment with necessary access to personal information
-Gain access to valuable and relevant health data quickly
-Enable the option for patients and their guardians to consent to donate their clinical data for research
-Adhere with privacy regulations
-Minimize potential personal identifiable information vulnerability leakage
“As the digital health ecosystem matures, we see a growing demand to support a key demographic with delegation and fine grained data access control. The work with TrustSphere and the BCCH is representative of this demographic of critical caregivers who are key to supporting the patient journey and outcomes. As a person who is active in both my children and my aging parents' health journeys, this capability is both timely and powerful.”
– Mike Cook, CEO, IDENTOS
Availability
IDENTOS’ information delegation technology will first be implemented as part of the BC Children’s Hospital’s diabetes research initiative. This software capability is available as a feature of the Digital Identity Wallet available for any customer to trial and purchase today.
As part of the development of this product, Dr. Yoelit Lipinsky has authored an industry guide to Ethical Design for Mobile Apps, which also outlines pediatric consent and assent. It is available for download here.