Systematizing Genome Privacy Research: A Privacy-Enhancing Technologies Perspective

TL;DR

This paper systematically reviews privacy-enhancing technologies in genome data privacy, analyzing current research, identifying challenges, and highlighting the inherent difficulties in protecting genomic information.

Contribution

It provides a structured analysis of recent genome privacy research, identifying limitations and challenges, and emphasizes the complexity of privacy issues unique to genomic data.

Findings

Identification of key limitations in current privacy technologies

Discussion of inherent challenges tied to genomic data characteristics

Survey results highlighting expert perspectives on privacy issues

Abstract

Rapid advances in human genomics are enabling researchers to gain a better understanding of the role of the genome in our health and well-being, stimulating hope for more effective and cost efficient healthcare. However, this also prompts a number of security and privacy concerns stemming from the distinctive characteristics of genomic data. To address them, a new research community has emerged and produced a large number of publications and initiatives. In this paper, we rely on a structured methodology to contextualize and provide a critical analysis of the current knowledge on privacy-enhancing technologies used for testing, storing, and sharing genomic data, using a representative sample of the work published in the past decade. We identify and discuss limitations, technical challenges, and issues faced by the community, focusing in particular on those that are inherently tied to the nature of the problem and are harder for the community alone to address. Finally, we report on the importance and difficulty of the identified challenges based on an online survey of genome data privacy experts