Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Google/Fitbit will monetise health data and harm consumers

voxeu.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 156 posts

Re: Google/Fitbit will monetise health data and harm consumers

#71

Post by BurningFrog »

shadowgovt wrote: post #41

The argument they're making here is a little subtle, but it tracks. They're not claiming Google will hand out a user's biometrics to insurance companies or other parties. They're claiming Google will offer biometrically-based signal as an ad discrimination channel. At that point, they don't have to hand out the data to allow insurance companies to discriminate; insurance companies could set up targeted ads for Cadill…

Let me just point out that the root problem here is the broken US "health insurance" system.

That targeted ads might cause these kinds of problems is a side effect of this.

Re: Google/Fitbit will monetise health data and harm consumers

#72

Post by alienfilesystem »

throwaway_pdp09 wrote: post #69
alienfilesystem wrote: post #68

I'm going to come across here as an odd outlier, and that's OK. I accept it. Being in IT for 20 years has shown me that none of these companies can be trusted. Since I have to have a mobile phone, I chose Apple. I don't believe that there are "lesser evils". You're evil or you're not. Full stop. I do my best to use open source tools (save iPhone) in my house. Granted, there are no open source TVs, Roku's, etc, but th…

Mine is to be an opinion-only post but... > You're evil or you're not. Full stop. ... I'm afraid I can't agree.

I appreciate your comment, but let's be honest, good and evil are binary like night and day. I don't cotton to the idea that one's morals can be suspended in "twilight". There are ways to make tons of money and be completely moral.

Re: Google/Fitbit will monetise health data and harm consumers

#73

Post by m16ghost »

shadowgovt wrote: post #43
meroes wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

google bought the insurance startup

What insurance startup? Are we talking hypotheticals here or concrete action Google is undertaking? I agree that Google + FitBit + Google owning a health insurance company would be suspect, but I'm unaware of them buying a health insurance company. Certainly, if the concern is government intervention, the intervention should hold off until an insurance startup is actually on the table?

Alphabet owns a company called Verily, which is entering the health reinsurance space:

https://www.theverge.com/2020/8/25/21401124/alphabet-verily-...

Verily already has its own smartwatch though.

Re: Google/Fitbit will monetise health data and harm consumers

#74

Post by qppo »

shadowgovt wrote: post #41

The argument they're making here is a little subtle, but it tracks. They're not claiming Google will hand out a user's biometrics to insurance companies or other parties. They're claiming Google will offer biometrically-based signal as an ad discrimination channel. At that point, they don't have to hand out the data to allow insurance companies to discriminate; insurance companies could set up targeted ads for Cadill…

Personally I'm more worried about companies outside the healthcare markets getting access to health data more than insurance companies. But it seems like everyone is in agreement on that.

I'd bet money that with consistent access to sleep cycles, heart rate, blood pressure, ecg, and body temperature combined with device analytics (screen time, content watched/listened to) you could easily come up with a behavioral model that identifies users suffering from depression and anxiety.

And while it could be useful and positive (for example, they already can identify and target smokers with smoking cessation ads), I'm more afraid of malicious actors targeting people already prone to destructive behavior with feedback loops that worsen their symptoms and profit off it.

For example: User 123 is experiencing a panic attack. Send notification that Uber Eats now delivers alcohol.

Re: Google/Fitbit will monetise health data and harm consumers

#75

Post by luckylion »

shadowgovt wrote: post #66
luckylion wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't forget that Google allows some ad buyers to run their own JS inside the app. They could embed additional tracking and would get the hit without the user even clicking.

Not in a way they reveals demographics; that JS is sandboxed and can't generally figure out why the ad was run. There's room for abuse, but Google will slap wrists of advertisers who try it.

You don't need to figure out why the ad was run if you target the ad to people who match the demographic you want to identify. It runs because it fits the match.

I don't know whether Google will slap any wrists. It went so far that their ads hijacked the browser and redirected to scam sites. I've been on the debugging end on a few such attacks over the years, and it just happened once every other year or so on sites with a healthy amount of traffic. The scammers do try to fly under the radar (only targeting specific sites, only targeting mobile and specific demographics to make it harder to track). If they simply didn't allow them the access, the problem wouldn't exist.

Re: Google/Fitbit will monetise health data and harm consumers

#76

Post by treis »

shadowgovt wrote: post #41

The argument they're making here is a little subtle, but it tracks. They're not claiming Google will hand out a user's biometrics to insurance companies or other parties. They're claiming Google will offer biometrically-based signal as an ad discrimination channel. At that point, they don't have to hand out the data to allow insurance companies to discriminate; insurance companies could set up targeted ads for Cadill…

This argument rests on an undeseriable business practice. Essentially we don't want insurance companies to discriminate on the health of potential buyers so let's stop Google from acquiring that data. But if that's what we want it makes more sense to ban the thing we don't want to happen. Namely, don't allow insurance companies to discriminate on the health of buyers.

Re: Google/Fitbit will monetise health data and harm consumers

#77

Post by ksk »

OskarS wrote: post #46
anotherman554 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple will never have "enough" money and will do practically anything do get more money.

You're missing the point. Apple makes money by people buying their products, and Apple sells more products when people trust them. Therefore, they have a strong financial incentive to be trustworthy and at least appear to care about user privacy. The best way to appear to care about user privacy is to actually care about it: they make no money selling private information to 3rd parties, so there's no point in doing i…

> and Apple sells more products when people trust them.

I am interested to know how you have estimated/measured this increase. Is it 1%? 20%? What does your data show?

Re: Google/Fitbit will monetise health data and harm consumers

#78

Post by read_if_gay_ »

alienfilesystem wrote: post #72
throwaway_pdp09 wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mine is to be an opinion-only post but... > You're evil or you're not. Full stop. ... I'm afraid I can't agree.

I appreciate your comment, but let's be honest, good and evil are binary like night and day. I don't cotton to the idea that one's morals can be suspended in "twilight". There are ways to make tons of money and be completely moral.

In a philosophical sense yes, but there’s degrees to both of them, and once you consider practical issues your options will often be a mix of good and evil.

Re: Google/Fitbit will monetise health data and harm consumers

#80

Post by actuator »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #44
actuator wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe that's what Google has been trying to do here with diversifying their revenue sources, similar to what they are attempting to do with GCP. Look at the amount of control they have been adding on Pixel phones on what apps and services can access, even Google's.

The difference is Google doesn't stop monetizing your data when they start selling premium hardware.

How do you know this to be true? Are they using Nest data to monetize something?

Apple also tried their hands at iAds, in the end companies will do whatever works best for them. Considering Apple has made privacy a marketing feature for their devices, I am quite sure Google would want to have that playbook as well for their premium devices.

Post reply on HN