Facebook sent a doctor on a secret mission to ask hospitals to share patient data

[sl8]

From https://www.cnbc.com/2018/04/05/facebook-building-8-explored-data-sharing-agreement-with-hospitals.html

Facebook sent a doctor on a secret mission to ask hospitals to share patient data

Christina Farr
Published 6 Hours Ago Updated 2 Hours Ago

• Facebook was in talks with top hospitals and other medical groups as recently as last month about a proposal to share data about the social networks of their most vulnerable patients.

• The idea was to build profiles of people that included their medical conditions, information that health systems have, as well as social and economic factors gleaned from Facebook.

• Facebook said the project is on hiatus so it can focus on "other important work, including doing a better job of protecting people's data."

Facebook has asked several major U.S. hospitals to share anonymized data about their patients, such as illnesses and prescription info, for a proposed research project. Facebook was intending to match it up with user data it had collected, and help the hospitals figure out which patients might need special care or treatment.

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More at link.

[Lint Head]

1. That is a violation of the HIPPA Privacy Law.

[cwydro]

6. The law is HIPAA, not HIPPA.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

8. Selling anonymized data is not a HIPAA violation and your healthcare organization is probably doing

it.

[uppityperson]

2. Hippa should say hell no

[Squinch]

3. And still people use Facebook.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

9. Facebook is not the only company buying data, and many healthcare organiztions are certainly

selling it.

[Squinch]

15. If we were to find out that Starbucks was poisoning the coffee, would you

think it was reasonable to stop patronizing Starbucks? Or would you say other companies were poisoning their coffee too, suggesting, I guess, that we should just go ahead and keep drinking Starbucks poison coffee?

What is with this "whataboutism" that always comes up about Facebook? They are fucking with their users. They are going a far way to destroying our electoral system.

I'm sorry, but anyone who still uses them is foolish.

Yes, people suck everywhere. And when we learn about it, we should stop rewarding them.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

16. It's not "whataboutism." It's trying to explain to people the scope of what they need to be

concerned about if they're mad only about Facebook. Shutting down your Facebook account does nothing to address the fact that data around your behavior at work, school, healthcare facility, online (even DU!), purchasing decisions and more is all being collected and commodified. Facebook is a small part of it. When it comes to data commodification, we're soaking in it.

[Squinch]

17. Yes, but it's as good a place - probably one of the best - to start. Because it IS

wrecking our Democracy. (Yes, I know so are other outlets.)

I do agree that the scope is huge. Perhaps a benefit of this may be to alert people to how little control they have over anything that goes on the internet.

[likesmountains 52]

4. HIPAA..please, not HIPPA

[magicarpet]

5. Imagine the money FaceBook would rake in...

.... if they could be control central for health data. Employers, - life, health, and disability insurance companies would fork over big buck to get their hands on that data.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

10. Companies are already buying and selling anonymized healthcare data.

[sarah FAILIN]

11. This.

They are sleeping with us at night listening to us snore to see who is a health risk for the insurance companies. That is about what it feels like.

It is not limited to fb, it is everywhere. Every item I Google ends up in the ads here.

[Hekate]

7. More and more appalling

[backtoblue]

12. Wth???

[Clarity2]

13. This was not going to be anonymous!

However, the company proposed using a common cryptographic technique called hashing to match individuals who were in both data sets. That way, both parties would be able to tell when a specific set of Facebook data matched up with a specific set of patient data.

Thats basically cross matching an anonymous data set with a known person on FB with the same data. So were they going to target ads to these people based on fears about their illness? Political or otherwise??

Calling bs on wanting to help patients. They are not in the business of that.

[KentuckyWoman]

14. You have no privacy.

In 2003 I signed up on Web MD under a fake name starting research when my husband was first diagnosed. No address, no phone, just a fake email and that name and a mixed up date of birth. Within 3 months I was getting MAIL at my home under the fake name. The only way I see that could happen is if the Web MD sold the name and email address and some data mining company put it together with the info they bought from my internet provider.

So I switched to a different internet provider. Put the service in my maiden name which I had not used in over 40 years. Sure enough, next thing I know I'm getting calls asking for me via my maiden name and assorted junk mail.

2 years ago we bought a used vehicle with a wheelchair lift specifically for my mother in law. She wanted it tagged in her name and insisted on paying for it. Upon her death last year, we retagged the vehicle in my husband's name. Within a month of buying it, we were getting mail for after market warranties, catalogs for mobility aids, you name it. Someone sold info... someone bought and sold it again.

Any piece of info.. anything.... is being bought and sold and the dots connected millions of times a day. The ads on the billboard in a certain zip are partly there because of what was charged on the credit cards in that zip code.

There is no privacy. Period.