HDS

What HDS certification is

HDS (Hébergeur de Données de Santé, “Health Data Host”) certification is mandated by the French Code de la santé publique for any organisation that hosts personal health data in the context of care or prevention services. It is delivered by accredited certification bodies (LNE, AFNOR, Bureau Veritas) on the basis of the HDS reference framework, with an initial audit and annual surveillance audits.

Foreign organisations that host health data of French residents are equally required to be certified.

Six scopes

The certification covers six distinct scopes, at least one of which must be qualified:

1. Provision and maintenance of physical sites.
2. Hardware infrastructure.
3. Hosting platform.
4. Virtual infrastructure.
5. Information system administration.
6. Backup as a service.

To host a typical patient record system, scopes 3 and 5 are normally needed. For pure off-site backups, scope 6 alone is enough.

Who needs it

Medical practices, clinics, private hospitals, health software vendors, labs, pharmacies, MSPs and ESN intervening on the IT of healthcare structures. Public hospitals benefit from a partial derogation but must still respect the framework.

HDS at Hexceos

Our sovereign datacenter is HDS-certified. We host medical practices, health vendors and public health structures from France, with a dedicated 24/7 SOC for security monitoring of the data concerned. See our practical HDS guide.