Dear Colleagues,

Innovation in technologies and services for active and assisted living (AAL) stands out as one promising solution to address the healthcare and social challenges produced by the demographic change and current economic context. AAL systems make use of a variety of sensors to monitor the environment and its dwellers to improve the quality of life and support independent and healthy living of older or impaired people at home, at the workplace, and in public spaces.

Recent advances in wearable computing, with a myriad of products in the market (e.g., wearable cameras and smart watches, wristbands, and glasses), increased functionality of mobile devices and apps for health and wellbeing, and easier installation of and cheaper home automation systems are supporting the adoption of healthcare and assisted living services by a larger population. For instance, lifelogging technologies may enable and motivate individuals to pervasively capture data about them, their environments, and the people with whom they interact. Acquisition, measurement, and processing of physiological signals (e.g., heart rate, respiratory rate, body temperature, and skin conductance), motion, location, performed activities, images seen, and sounds heard are the basis for the provision of a variety of cutting-edge services to age in place by increasing peoples’ health, wellbeing, and independence. In smart life, examples of these technological services include providing personalized healthcare, monitoring wellness and quality of life (e.g., physical activity, dietary habits), supporting people with memory cognitive impairments, assisting with social participation, helping with mobility, supporting formal and family caregivers, using predictive systems to address among others, decline in cognition, aggressive behaviors, and fall prevention.

Despite the numerous advantages, users can perceive this continuous monitoring as intrusive and in violation of fundamental rights to privacy and data protection, because of the concern that data could be accessed by unauthorized users or stored for inappropriate use. Depending on the individual technology and the context of use, users’ acceptance of such technologies can also be low because they create a sense of Orwellian “Big Brother” surveillance.

Therefore, this Special Issue, supported by project PAAL—Privacy-Aware and Acceptable Lifelogging services for older and frail people, addresses not only sensors in the latest technological advances in lifelogging and monitoring technologies, but also current research related to user acceptance, ethics, data protection, and privacy-by-design.

Dr. Francisco Florez-Revuelta
Dr. Susanna Spinsante
Dr. Wiktoria Wilkowska
Dr. Pau Climent-Perez
Guest Editors

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