Hold Off on Trying to Sell Your Personal Information to Web-Based Brokers

A recent op-ed piece in the NYT bySarah Jeong raised the issue of selling one's personal information on the web and made a number of important points (see:Selling Your Private Information Is a Terrible Idea). Below is as excerpt from it:PatientSphere, a platform for health care information, purports to offer patients “the ability to not only share” data on their own terms, “but also get paid for it.”PatientTruth similarly bills itself as a health record system and a way for patients to “own” and “monetize” their health data....All of these apps, platforms and services use blockchain — a technology first used by bitcoin, a type of digital money — to store health information. Because the term “blockchain” has become so nebulous, it’s difficult to pin down the actual upsides to storing health data this way. In most situations, blockchain is not any more secure, reliable or usable than its alternatives. But it does have one distinct advantage: A data-sharing platform can double as both database and cryptocurrency. Behold, the data pays for itself....There ’s no legal property right to personal data. Once personal data is gathered, it’s out there for anyone to buy and sell.At the moment, there are no legal grounds to demand compensation for use.What these new companies are trying do is to create a new type of data brokerage system that replaces the current system of data brokerage....[D]e-identified health information is already being sold to phar...
Source: Lab Soft News - Category: Laboratory Medicine Authors: Tags: Electronic Health Record (EHR) Healthcare Information Technology Lab Information Medical Consumerism Medical Ethics Medicolegal Issues Pharmaceutical Industry Source Type: blogs