“Incredibly valuable” smartwatch data could be used by health insurance companies to raise premiums, a UCD professor has warned.
On Newstalk Breakfast today, Dr Cailbhe Doherty said intimate health data such as heartbeat and oxygen levels have become a valuable commodity for big tech in recent years.
A survey he conducted has shown more than half of Irish people now own some form of wearable technology, such as an Apple Watch or Fitbit.
While Dr Doherty said this technology can be useful in understanding your own health, it could be used negatively in the wrong hands.
“This [data] could be used to leverage your insurance premium or deny you insurance altogether,” he said.
“There was a recent scandal with the UK biobank where they were setting out their terms and conditions and said they would never give their data, which included genetic material and blood samples, to insurance companies.
“They’ve railed back on that very recently because the data is incredibly valuable for insurance companies because of the window it gives into someone’s disease risk.”
Smartwatch Uses
Dr Doherty said wearable devices capture a “huge amount of data” from the user.
“You strap on a smartwatch and you can track workouts, sleep, oxygen saturation, respiratory rate and more,” he said.
"This data could be incredibly powerful and it’s not a stretch to say they are a portal, not only into how healthy you are now but for how healthy or unhealthy you are likely to be in the future.”
Advancements
Dr Doherty said recent advancements in AI and data analytics could be used to analyse public health data compiled through smartwatches.
“We could uncover things about human health we have never known before,” he said.
“You could have profiles of disease risk, your current health, mortality risk, but we haven’t made any major breakthroughs.
“Nobody has taken those large data sets from wearable device owners and developed new algorithms or systems to quantify health or mortality or disease risk – yet.”
It is important to check the terms and conditions before using wearable technology to see if they allow third-party access to data, according to the professor.
Dr Doherty added that some companies are good and others “not so much” when it comes to data protection.
You can listen back here:
Main image: A woman checking her pulse on a smartwatch. Image: Eugene Mynzul / Alamy Stock Photo
