Surveillance Outbreak Response Management and Analysis System

SORMAS is an open source mobile and web-based eHealth software for organizing and facilitating disease control, outbreak management procedures, disease surveillance, and epidemiological analysis for all administrative levels of the public health system. SORMAS aims to improve prevention, early detection and control of communicable diseases. SORMAS adheres to the highest data protection standards, good scientific practice, and open access policy.

Website: https://www.sormas.org

Type of Digital Public Good

  • Open content
  • Open data
  • ✅  Open software
  • Open standard
  • Open AI model

1. Is it relevant to one of the Sustainable Development Goals?

  • 3. Good Health and Well-being

    Evidence: Digital health is a dynamic field that has been generating a large number of tools; many of these tools do not have the level of maturity required to function in a sustainable model. It is in this context that the concept of global goods maturity is gaining importance. Digital Square developed a global good maturity model (GGMM) for digital health tools, which engages the digital health community to identify areas of investment for global goods. The Surveillance Outbreak Response Management and Analysis System (SORMAS) is an open-source mobile and web application software that we developed to enable health workers to notify health departments about new cases of epidemic-prone diseases, detect outbreaks, and simultaneously manage outbreak response.

    Link to Evidence: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7221633/

2. Does it use an appropriate open license?

Yes, this project is licensed under the following license(s):

3. Is ownership clearly defined?

Is the ownership of the project and everything that the project produces clearly defined and documented?

Yes

If yes - please link to the relevant copyright, trademarks, or ownership documentation for the project.

https://github.com/hzi-braunschweig

4. Does the license of libraries/dependencies undermine the openess of the project?

Does this open project have mandatory dependencies (i.e. libraries, hardware) that create more restrictions than the original license?

No

If yes - are the open source components able to demonstrate independence from the closed component(s) and/or are there functional, open alternatives?

Not Applicable

If yes - please describe how the open source components are independent and/or list the open alternatives for the closed component:

Not Applicable

5. Is there documentation?

Does some documentation exist of the source code, use cases, and/or functional requirements. For software projects, this should be present as technical documentation that would allow a technical person unfamiliar with the project to launch and run the software. For datasets and data projects, this should be present as documentation that describes all the fields in the set, and provides context on how the data was collected and how it should be interpreted. For content collections, this should indicate any relevant compatible apps, software, hardware required to access the content and any instructions about how to use it.

Yes

If yes - please link to the relevant documentation:

6. Is non PII data and/or content accessible?

Does this project collect or use non-personally identifiable information (non-PII) data and/or content?

Yes

If yes - is there a mechanism for extracting or importing non-personally identifiable information (non-PII) from the system in a non-proprietary format?

Yes

If yes - describe the mechanism for extracting or importing non-personally identifiable information from the system in a non-proprietary format:

Non personally identifiable information (PII) can be imported or exported using the SORMAS API. The SORMAS API has configurations to permit pseudonymized or anonymized data exchange as well as user right configurations.

7. Does the project adhere to privacy and other applicable international and domestic laws?

Has this project taken steps to ensure adherence with relevant privacy, domestic, and international laws? For example, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in the European Union or the Supplementary Act A/SA.1/01/10 on Personal Data Protection for the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) (yes/no)

Yes

If yes, please list some of relevant laws that the project complies with:

  • GDPR

If yes, please describe the steps this project has taken to ensure adherence (include links to terms of service, privacy policy, or other relevant documentation):

  • The data collection and management in SORMAS are governed by the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) where it applies. The countries using SORMAS are responsible for complying with regulation and local legislation.

8. Does the project adhere to standards and best practices?

Does this project support standards? (i.e. Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1 or other standards such as those listed on W3C)

Yes

Which standards does this project support (please list)

  • REST

Can you point to evidence of your support? (i.e. please link to your validator, open test suite, etc.)

Was this project built and developed according to or in adherence with any design, technical and/or sector best practices or principles? i.e. the Principles for Digital Development?

Yes

Which principles and best practices does this project support (please list)

  • Principles for digital development

9. Does the project do no harm by design?

Has this project taken steps to anticipate, prevent and do no harm by design?

On the whole, does this project take steps to ensure that it anticipates, prevents and does no harm by design?

Yes

Is there any additional information you would like to share about the mechanisms, processes or policies that this project uses to avoid doing harm by design?

Data transferred throughout SORMAS API or exported can be pseudonymized if needed. SORMAS Keycloak is available as an alternative authentication provider to the default authentication method. SORMAS is checked on a yearly basis by an external security audit.

9.a. Data Privacy & Security

Does this project collect or store personally identifiable information (PII) data and/or content?

Yes

If yes - please list the types of data and/or content collected and/or stored by the project:

  • Surveillance data (e.g; case, contacts, events, samples, Immunizations, etc) only and fully owed by the public health authorities in the country that uses the tool

If yes - does this project share this data and/or content with third parties?

No

Please describe the circumstances with which this project shares data and/or content with third parties. Please add links as relevant.

  • We the developers of the tool have no access to the data.

If yes - does the project ensure the privacy, security and integrity of this data and/or content collection and has it taken steps to prevent adverse impacts resulting from its collection, storage and distribution.

Yes

If yes - please describe the steps, and include a link to the privacy policy and/or terms of service:

Data transferred throughout SORMAS API or exported can be pseudonymized if needed. SORMAS Keycloak is available as an alternative authentication provider to the default authentication method. SORMAS is checked on a yearly basis by an external security audit.
https://github.com/hzi-braunschweig/SORMAS-Project/blob/development/sormas-base/doc/keycloak.md
In addition, there is a configuration in the tool that stakeholders can use to define the read, write, or even complete anonymization access to entities or their PII data for users of the system.
Since each country setup their own server (either local or cloud), we encourage stakeholders to always go with a solution having a server backup configuration.

9.b. Inappropriate & Illegal Content

Does this project collect, store or distribute content?

No

If yes - what kinds of content does this project, collect, store or distribute? (i.e. childrens books)

Not Applicable

If yes - does this project have policies that describe what is considered innappropriate content? (i.e. child sexual abuse materials)

Not Applicable

If yes - please link to the relevant policy/guidelines/documentation.

Not Applicable

If yes - does this project have policies and processes for detecting and moderating innappropriate/illegal content?

Not Applicable

If yes - please describe the policies and processes for detecting, reporting and removing innapropriate/illegal content (Please include the average response time for assessment and/or action. Link to any policies or descriptions of how inappropriate content is handled):

Not Applicable

9.c. Protection from harassment

Does this project facilitate interactions with or between users or contributors?

Yes

If yes - does the project take steps to address the safety and security of underage users?

Yes

If yes - please describe the steps this project takes to address risk or prevent access by underage users:

  • The interactions between users and contributors takes place on the GitHub platform mainly. This ensures transparency of the communication. The SORMAS users and contributors consist of public health professionals who are in the age group of the working population (more than 20 years old).

If yes - does the project help users and contributors protect themselves against grief, abuse, and harassment?

Yes

If yes - please describe the steps taken to help users protect themselves.

Development & deployment countries

List of countries this project was developed in.

  • Germany
  • Nigeria
  • Ghana
  • France

List of countries this project is actively deployed in.

  • Nigeria
  • Ghana
  • Fiji
  • Germany
  • Switzerland
  • France
  • Côte d'Ivoire