Your health data in Google’s hands
p2pnet news view | Advertising:- “Americans have come one frightening step closer to having every aspect of their lives, including their most intimate medical details, fall under the venal eyes of Google and other corporate giants,” p2pnet posted when news of the Google Doctor ’service’ first broke, going on:
“And what’s equally frightening is the fact the corporate media are reporting this as though it’s a genuine service created to help people.
“Because despite all assurances, ‘privacy’ promises, and all the rest of it, once Google has your data, it has your data.
“Period.”
Now, “Google just got access to millions of prescription records, and most likely, so did you,” says a Reader’s Write, pointing to a story on Mashable, which states »»»
GoogleGoogle reviews announced today that CVS/pharmacy, one of the largest pharmacy chains in the U.S., has partnered with Google Health to provide patients online access to their prescription drug history through Google Health accounts. This is in addition to Walgreens Pharmacy, Meijer, Medco, and other national pharmacies.
If you purchased prescription drugs from any of these chains, Google can access that information in its never ending goal to organize the world’s information and make it accessible and useful. But is Google having access to private prescription drug information a step too far?
Says Google:
” Once your medication information is in Google Health, you can use our new sharing feature to share it with anyone in your care network, including family members, doctors, and other caregivers.”
And once it’s online, it’s potentially up for grabs for anyone with the skill to tap into it.
Can’t be done?
Sure it can.
Google having access to private personal data of any kind is going too far.
But it’s too late, though. The stable is door is wide open and the horse has gone.
Meanwhile, “Google has been disingenuously pretending advertising is the last thing on his mind,” said the p2pnet post cited earlier, adding »»»
However, “Google said it wouldn’t start out selling ads but wouldn’t rule it out,” says USA Today, going on:
“Gene Munster, an analyst at Piper Jaffray, firmly believes ads will happen.”
After all, “Advertisers would pay absurd amounts of money to be seen when someone wants to, say, refill a subscription online,” he says.
“This is more lucrative than commerce-related search.”
No need to stay tuned.
p2pnet – Dr Google – on the way, February 29, 2008
Mashable – Do You Want Google To Have Access to Your Prescription Records?, April 6, 2009
USA Today – Prognosis is bright for Google’s health records plan, February 28, 2008
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April 8th, 2009 at 10:59 am
Not only that, but it will create direct user-targeted advertising by knowing which meds you are on.
Do you take blood pressure pills? Healthy harvest crunch cereal will target u
Do you take a pill for over active bladder? Depends will target u (or some astronaut diaper maker).
Get your whole prescription history? They can probably make out each illness you and your kids have and will have (genetically targeted) and target u based on this.
I won’t use a pharmacy that would give google my data. I hope these pharmacies informed their customer before any data is given.
Wait till the exploits comes out..
April 8th, 2009 at 6:52 pm
I respect Google as a search engine. However, this is definitely too much for them to be doing.
I don’t want Google to have my private medical history. I don’t trust their systems administrators not to take a peek. I don’t trust that data won’t be leaked, sold to the highest bidder, or otherwise mistreated. It’s happened before, after all (youtube/warner takedowns, for example).
You can be sure that I’ll fastidiously avoid the pharmacies noted here, and I will make a statement to every pharmacy I do go to that I don’t want this information spread around. I thought doctors and pharmacists had privacy laws to uphold? How is selling my data to google, noble cause or not, permissible under said privacy laws? Inquiring minds want to know.
April 8th, 2009 at 10:19 pm
Now this is a service where I think Google is going too far, in that the data is not something that anyone can just go to a library to read, or drive up to take a look at.
There is a difference in public information and private information, and private information like this should not be handled by any advertising agency, whether it be online or not.
Just my two cents