Draft Code of Conduct on Privacy for Mobile Health Applications

Mobile health applications have a clear potential to bring significant benefits to individual citizens and to society as a whole. Citizens can benefit from continuous and readily accessible support in monitoring, evaluating and improving their health. Society as a whole not only benefits from having a healthier population, but can also gain new knowledge and develop new services and applications on the basis of the data processed via these apps.

However, data concerning health is highly privacy sensitive. Therefore, mobile health apps must be designed in such a way that the privacy of the end users is optimally protected. Similarly, these apps have the potential to empower users, provided that: the users receive sufficient insight into the functioning of the app, and are able to assess more easily which of the many apps on the market meet their privacy concerns. This Code has been developed with these goals in mind: it provides an accessible and effective tool to ensure that mobile health apps have been properly developed, and that they can be entrusted with data concerning health in a manner that complies with European legal principles of data protection law.

Download: Draft Code of Conduct on Privacy for Mobile Health Applications (.pdf, 672 KB).

Download from eHealthNews.eu: Draft Code of Conduct on Privacy for Mobile Health Applications (.pdf, 672 KB).

The Code of Conduct on privacy for mobile health apps has now been formally submitted for comments to the Art 29 Data Protection Working Party. Once approved by this independent EU advisory group, the Code will be applied in practice: App developers will be able to voluntarily commit to follow its rules, which are based on EU data protection legislation.

Most Popular Now

Relationship Between Sleep and Nutrition…

Diet and sleep, which are essential for human survival, are interrelated. However, recently, various services and mobile applications have been introduced for the self-management of health, allowing users to record...

AI Model can Read ECGs to Identify Femal…

A new AI model can flag female patients who are at higher risk of heart disease based on an electrocardiogram (ECG). The researchers say the algorithm, designed specifically for female patients...

New AI Tool Mimics Radiologist Gaze to R…

Artificial intelligence (AI) can scan a chest X-ray and diagnose if an abnormality is fluid in the lungs, an enlarged heart or cancer. But being right is not enough, said...

To be Happier, Take a Vacation... from Y…

Today, nearly every American - 91% - owns a cellphone that can access the internet, according to the Pew Research Center. In 2011, only about one-third did. Another study finds...

DMEA 2025 - Innovations, Insights and Ne…

8 - 10 April 2025, Berlin, Germany. Less than 50 days to go before DMEA 2025 opens its doors: Europe's leading event for digital health will once again bring together experts...

Researchers Find Telemedicine may Help R…

Low-value care - medical tests and procedures that provide little to no benefit to patients - contributes to excess medical spending and both direct and cascading harms to patients. A...

AI Revolutionizes Glaucoma Care

Imagine walking into a supermarket, train station, or shopping mall and having your eyes screened for glaucoma within seconds - no appointment needed. With the AI-based Glaucoma Screening (AI-GS) network...

North Cumbria Integrated Care Signs 10-Y…

North Cumbria Integrated Care NHS Foundation Trust (NCIC) has signed a long-term agreement for use of the Alcidion Miya Precision platform, to provide an electronic patient record (EPR) for the...

AI Accelerates Discovery of Neurodevelop…

Researchers have developed an artificial intelligence (AI) approach that accelerates the identification of genes that contribute to neurodevelopmental conditions such as autism spectrum disorder, epilepsy and developmental delay. This new...

AI may Help Clinicians Personalize Treat…

Individuals with generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), a condition characterized by daily excessive worry lasting at least six months, have a high relapse rate even after receiving treatment. Artificial intelligence (AI)...

AI can Open Up Beds in the ICU

At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, hospitals frequently ran short of beds in intensive care units. But even earlier, ICUs faced challenges in keeping beds available. With an aging...

AI Model Predicting Two-Year Risk of Com…

AFib (short for atrial fibrillation), a common heart rhythm disorder in adults, can have disastrous consequences including life-threatening blood clots and stroke if left undetected or untreated. A new study...