Secure Alert Messaging via Authenticated Links for Confidential Data
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Solution Overview
Problem
The proliferation of messaging channels complicates ensuring that urgent and confidential information, such as medical alerts, reaches the right recipients securely and efficiently, while proprietary systems create management challenges for healthcare professionals dealing with multiple service providers.
Innovation Solution
A computer system that processes messages to include a hyperlink to a secure webpage for confidential information, allowing recipients to customize delivery rules and logs message events, ensuring secure and efficient delivery of urgent messages to appropriate devices.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Speed
If confidential information is transmitted over insecure messaging channels, then message delivery speed is improved, but security and confidentiality are compromised
Solution Approach 1:
The message is divided into two separate components: a notification message containing only non-sensitive metadata (sent via insecure channel for speed), and the actual confidential information (stored securely and accessed via authenticated link). This segmentation allows fast delivery of essential alert information while keeping sensitive data protected.
Solution Approach 2:
A secure authentication mechanism acts as an intermediary between the insecure messaging channel and the confidential information. The system uses authenticated links and session tokens that verify the recipient's identity before allowing access to sensitive data, thus mediating between the need for fast delivery and security requirements.
2Reliability
If multiple proprietary messaging systems are used to ensure comprehensive message delivery, then message delivery reliability is improved, but system complexity and management difficulty increase
Solution Approach 1:
The system provides a universal messaging platform that can handle multiple message types (alerts, notifications, secure communications) and support various delivery channels (email, SMS, web portal, mobile app) through a single integrated architecture. This eliminates the need for separate proprietary systems for each communication type.
Solution Approach 2:
Multiple messaging functions and channels are merged into a single unified system. The platform combines alert delivery, secure data transmission, authentication, and user management into one integrated solution, reducing the number of separate systems healthcare professionals must manage.
3Loss of information
If all message content is included in the notification to ensure complete information delivery, then information completeness is improved, but security risks increase due to exposure over insecure channels
Solution Approach 1:
The message content is segmented into sensitive and non-sensitive portions. The notification message includes only non-sensitive metadata (patient name, test type, urgency level), while sensitive details (actual test results, personal health information) are stored securely and accessed only after authentication. This ensures information completeness while minimizing security risks.
Solution Approach 2:
The sensitive information is extracted from the notification message and placed in a separate secure storage system. The notification only carries the essential alert information, while the extracted sensitive data remains protected behind authentication mechanisms, preventing exposure over insecure channels.
Data Source
AI summary
Embodiments of the invention include systems and methods for transmitting messages related to certain information while maintaining the confidentiality of that information. A potential recipient may register one or more devices for receipt of such messages while specifying rules regarding when different messages may be delivered to the various devices. To keep sensitive information confidential, the messages may include only a link to such sensitive information, but exclude the sensitive information itself. An authorized recipient may then use the link to access the sensitive information via a password-protected Web site.