Researchers who collaborate on clinical research studies from diffuse
locations need a convenient, inexpensive, secure way to record and manage
data. The Internet, with its World Wide Web, provides a vast network that
enables researchers with diverse types of computers and operating systems
anywhere in the world to log data through a common interface. Development
of a Web site for scientific data collection can be organized into 10 steps,
including planning the scientific database, choosing a database management
software system, setting up database tables for each collaborator's variables,
developing the Web site's screen layout, choosing a middleware software system
to tie the database software to the Web site interface, embedding data editing
and calculation routines, setting up the database on the central server computer,
obtaining a unique Internet address and name for the Web site, applying security
measures to the site, and training staff who enter data. Ensuring the security
of an Internet database requires limiting the number of people who have access
to the server, setting up the server on a stand-alone computer, requiring
user-name and password authentication for server and Web site access, installing
a firewall computer to prevent break-ins and block bogus information from
reaching the server, verifying the identity of the server and client computers
with certification from a certificate authority, encrypting information sent
between server and client computers to avoid eavesdropping, establishing audit
trails to record all accesses into the Web site, and educating Web site users
about security techniques. When these measures are carefully undertaken, in
our experience, information for scientific studies can be collected and maintained
on Internet databases more efficiently and securely than through conventional
systems of paper records protected by filing cabinets and locked doors.