A Distributed Ledger Based Framework for Health Related Data Integrity

Abstract

With the growing integration of cloud computing and the increasing adoption of Internet-of-Things (IoT) devices, ensuring the integrity and privacy of data has become critical in digital systems. Data integrity is fundamental to maintain the completeness and reliability of data throughout the data lifecycle. Its importance is particularly evident in domains such as healthcare, where accurate diagnoses rely on trustworthy data. However, as systems evolve and become more complex, traditional centralised solutions often lack transparency and resilience, while resource-constrained devices make it more difficult to guarantee security and privacy. This thesis addresses these challenges by proposing a framework that integrates Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) to support privacy-preserving data sharing and strengthen trust among system stakeholders. Based on this framework, an architecture was designed with three main modules: a middleware integrator for service interoperability, an authorisation manager for fine-grained access control, and a data integrity validator leveraging metadata anchored on a distributed ledger to ensure compliance with the General Data Protection Regulation. A proof of concept was designed and implemented using IoT devices, healthcare data, and low-resource hardware. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed solution enables efficient data sharing and integrity validation with minimal overhead on the system. The DLT layer validated the integrity of shared data through a metadata model while preserving user privacy. Furthermore, the access control mechanism supported scalable and granular authorisation policies, and the middleware facilitated interoperability across heterogeneous stakeholders. This work contributes to new insights into the security of digital systems and provides responsible entities with a trustworthy approach for sharing data among diverse entities.