South Korea's Personal Information Protection Commission (PIPC) is moving to streamline regulations to enable broader use of healthcare data for advancing the domestic bio industry, including medical artificial intelligence and digital health sectors.
The PIPC held a field meeting with the Ministry of Health and Welfare at Seoul National University Hospital in Jongno-gu, Seoul, on January 9 to discuss measures for "rationalizing key K-Bio regulations." The meeting was organized to hear directly about regulatory and institutional challenges arising in the field during healthcare data utilization and to discuss improvements.
At the meeting, researchers from Kakao Healthcare and Seoul National University Hospital presented cases of AI development based on medical data and research trends in healthcare data utilization, explaining the importance of expanding data sharing and the difficulties faced by field researchers. In the discussion that followed, participants including university hospital researchers and medical AI and device development companies raised various issues, including ways to utilize deceased patients' medical data, difficulties in determining the adequacy of pseudonymization processing, and measures to enhance utilization of personal information innovation zones.
The PIPC introduced the main policy directions of the "Pseudonymous Information System and Operation Innovation Plan" announced in September last year, as well as newly introduced systems to support safe data utilization, including one-stop pseudonymization support services and no-action opinion letters for pseudonymous information.
PIPC Chairperson Song Kyung-hee said, "For the development of new bio industries, safe utilization of healthcare data based on trust among all stakeholders must be supported." She added, "We will work closely with relevant ministries including the Ministry of Health and Welfare to actively improve the difficulties in data utilization felt in the field."