The Data Drop News for January 22nd, 2021

WhatsApp privacy policy debacle, Singapore police want contact tracing app data, and US citizens getting more access to healthcare clinic data

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KEVIN

Millions of WhatsApp users have abandoned the app in response to a planned update that would share their private data with Facebook who purchased WhatsApp in 2014. Since the announcement was made last week, over 3 million people have signed up to rival messaging apps like Telegram and Signal.

In response, WhatsApp has pushed back its update to May 15th of this year. The policy change had originally been planned to start on February the eighth.

HILARY

In Singapore, the COVID response team has updated the privacy policy of the national contact tracing app, TraceTogether. The update authorizes the police to request that citizens share data for use in criminal investigations.

This is a change from the original privacy policy, which stated that data would only be used to help fight the coronavirus outbreak. About 80% of Singapore's population is currently using the app.

KEVIN

Back in North America, a new survey published by OpenNotes has revealed that 54 million patients are now able to access their medical appointment notes online. The survey, which collected data from 266 healthcare systems from across the U.S. and Canada shows that patient access to this data increased by nearly 10% last year when compared to 2019 figures.

The movement for open medical data is being driven in part by the 21st Century Cures Act, a U.S. law enacted in 2016 which requires that healthcare providers offer patients access to the information held in electronic medical records.

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