In theory, persons with impairments including elderly have the same rights of taking part in everyday life activities and society. However in practice, they are at risk of being excluded because of the great number of ICT solutions not addressing the needs of people with impairments. This paper describes a system which provides personalized services supporting people with impairments and patients travelling for medical reasons, work, social contacts, daily outdoor life activities, etc. In this paper, the authors focus on the scenarios, requirements, architecture, integration, requirements fulfillment, and conclusions of building an ambient intelligent travel companions.

This is the copy of the book chapter originally published in: Bromme, A., Busch, Ch. (ed.)(2011). Lecture Notes in Informatics, BIOSIG 2011, Proceedings - International Conference of the Biometrics Special Interest Group; 8.-9. September 2011 in Darmstadt. Bonn: Gesellschaft fur Informatik. Reprinted with permission from Gesellschaft fur Informatik.

The 21st century healthcare systems aim at involving citizen and health professionals alike entitling especially the citizens to take over a higher level of responsibility for their own health status. Applied technologies like, e. g., Internet, notebooks, and mobile phones enable patients to actively participate in treatment and rehabilitation. It's not any longer just health cards; it's an ongoing standardized personalization of health services including application of portable devices, sensors and actuators stipulating the personalized health approach while offering chances for practicing high quality wireless personalized shared care. The path from cards to personalized and portable devices tackles aspects like health advisors, RFDI technology, the EHR, chips, and smart objects. It is important to identify criteria and factors determining the application of such personalized devices in a wirelessly operated healthcare and welfare, the paradigm change from cards to secure wireless devices to mobile sensors, and the citizen's acceptance of underlying technologies. The presentations of the workshop jointly organized by EFMI WG "Personal Portable Devices (PPD)" and ISO/IEC JTC 1 "Study Group on Sensor Networks (SGSN)" therefore aim at introducing technical approaches and standardization activities as well as emerging implementations in the addressed domain.

The developing of innovative solutions in the emerging eHealth market requires strong economic efforts which may be justified only in presence of particularly suitable boundary conditions. Among the factors retained of primary importance for the development of eHealth, a correct approach to id-management is unanimously considered fundamental. Three keywords in the id-management context appear particularly important: standardization, security and safety. Standardization may contribute to increase the size and duration of the eHealth market, while security and safety may encourage all the stakeholders to trust in a appropriate and safe management of all the very sensitive personal data involved in the eHealth applications. The aim of the present paper is analyzing some security and safety issues in eHealth from the particular prospective of the identity management and standardization. The paper highlights the mission of the EU funded "BioHealth" project whose mission is to increase the stakeholders' knowledge about existing and emerging standards in eHealth with particular reference to identity management.

Reliable identification is essential in e-health and telemedicine applications. This necessitates a secure and trustworthy method of communication and collaboration between parties, which depends on common acceptance. This in turn is related to privacy and ethical matters. Different technologies, including biometrics and RFID, allow high levels of security and safety in identifying both human beings and goods. However, the diffusion of standards relating to identity management in e-health is far from satisfactory. In order to support standardization in e-health, the European Commission funded the BioHealth project. This project has proved to be useful in promoting standards and creating awareness among the stakeholders.

The experience gained in these last years and the several lesson learned have clearly shown that eHealth is more than just a simple change from paper records to electronic records. It necessitates a change of paradigms, on the one hand and the use of new technologies and introduction of new procedures on the other. Interoperability becomes a crucial issue. Security and confidentiality are vital for the acceptance of the new approaches and for the support of eHealth. Shared care and across-border interactions require a reliable and stable normative framework based on the application of standardized solutions, which are often not yet sufficiently known, diffused and implemented. Feeling this gap, a group of international experts in the medical area proposed to the EC the BioHealth project whose main aim is to create awareness about standardization in eHealth and to facilitate its practical implementation. The project will address all the stakeholders concerning their respective domain. It will evaluate the socio-economic and cultural aspects concerning eHealth with particular reference to the growing introduction of emerging technologies such as health cards, biometrics, RFID (radio-frequency identification) and NFC (Near field communication) tags. By providing information and expert advice on standardization and best practices it will raise the acceptance on standardization. Furthermore, the project will deeply approach the ethical and accessibility issues connected to identity management in eHealth, which -together with privacy- represent probably the most significant obstacles for the wide diffusion of eHealth procedures.

Modern healthcare in the 21 st century aims at involving citizen and health professionals alike entitling especially citizens to take over responsibility for their own health status. New technologies (Internet, mobile phones, sensors, etc.) enable patients to actively participate in healthcare processes. It's not any longer just health data storage data cards; it's an ongoing personalization of health services including application of portable devices and sensors/actors stipulating the personalized health approach which offers a real chance for practicing high quality wireless personalized shared care. The workshop jointly organized by EFMI WG "Personal Portable Devices (PPD)" and ISO/IEC JTC 1 "Study Group on Sensor Networks (SGSN)" will therefore aim at identifying a set of criteria/factors determining the application of personalized portable devices, sensors, and actors in a wireless healthcare and welfare, the paradigm change from health cards to wireless health devices, and the citizen's confidence in, and acceptance of, the underlying technologies and methods. The presentations are based on experience from different national, European and international projects and standardization activities as well as existing and emerging routine implementations in the domain.

Due to the strong economic efforts required for de veloping innovative solutions in new promising markets, such those rela ted to eHealth, the sustainability of investment becomes a key element for large and small companies.. Even if it can't guarantee market succe ss, following standards can help guaranteeing long-lasting solutions. Among all innovative sectors, eHealth represents one of the most challenging sectors from the standardization viewpoint as it combines different domains typical of medicin e with other issues such as security, safety, ethics or social guidelines. Most likely, this fragmentation of competences is a component of the difficult diffusi on of standards which undoubtedly characterizes eHealth and is a justific ation of the efforts carried out at an international level, in order to involve all its stakeholders. The aim of the present paper is describing how information on appl ied security and identity management standardization can be provided to users, and how these issues suggest the visualization of eHealth as a triangula r domain whose vertexes are represented by security, safety, and related techno logy and whose area is the domain of the social and ethical requirements. This representation corresponds to the approach followed by the EU "BioHealth" project which aims to increase the stakeholders' knowledge about existing and emerging security and identity management standards in eHealth (1).