The Federal Government contributed AU$500,000 early in 2020, in previously undisclosed funding, for the development of a new digital health consent solution, eConsent for Genomics which will store and share DNA test data and develop further a research project focused on COVID19 patients.
In response to recent cyber security breaches in Australia, the solution will allow individuals to store and share their genomics data. The government agency awarding the funds acknowledged current models for storing personal health information are consistently failing, with the health sector regularly topping the list of notifiable data breaches, as identified by the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner.
Partnering with 23Strands, Haventec will invest its own $500,000 in order to onboard data the data to its patented privacy platforms (Authenticate and Sanctum). The 23Strands research aims to correlate negative and positive health outcomes to specific DNA profiles with the ability to better predict an individual’s potential outcome should they become infected with COVID-19.
eConsent for Genomics received funding from the AustCyber Projects Fund, which concluded in February 2020 and announced in June, 2020. An AustCyber spokesperson confirmed, “The project was not ready for announcement when we did the group media release.”
Haventec CEO, Dave Maunsell, said that eConsent for Genomics will provide individuals with more control over how their personal health data is used and shared, without compromising their right to privacy. “In simple terms, Haventec’s platform reduces the exposure to risk. We have solved the paradox of keeping sensitive data safe, while supporting increasing demands, and consumer expectations, for openness, connectivity, performance and privacy.”
Mark Grosser, CEO of 23Strands said “The information managed in this pilot platform includes; patient personal information, patient consent instructions, patient medical analysis, diagnostics and test reports. We provide genome analysis of DNA and our platform correlates outcomes for patients based on medical, clinical and genetics analysis. This new and exciting project with Haventec will be linked to our service as a core platform for us to manage the storage and sharing of the genetic analysis reports we create for patients.”
