“Apple Health Data used in German murder case“- This article was interesting to me because I read this article with the background information that apple keeps their users data extremely private. In this article’s case apple wasn’t directly requested to hand over the data, a cyber forensics team was brought in to crack the iphone’s PIN code instead. I think that if apple had been asked to hand over the user’s data they would have denied, like they have in the past.
In class we also talked about mental health and how social media apps can affect someones mental health. More and more children and adolescents are being diagnosed with mental illnesses due to unrealistic expectations that social media portrays as normal. This article talks about apps and how they claim to drastically improve someones life, whether it be a cure to an illness, or a “scientifically proven” way to loose weight. These apps are not regulated by the FDA, and therefore have no grounds in making such claims. However, this article also discusses the many positives that apps have, such as medication reminders, and ways to contact licensed therapists with the touch of a button.
This video distinguishes the difference between how the older generation uses and views social media versus the younger generation. 90% of 18-29 year olds are on social media. The speaker notes “the highlight reel”, a collection of best and brightest moments. People see other’s “highlight reels” and compare their own “behind the scenes” to it. Comparing ourselves to others isn’t a new phenomena, however, now it is constant. We can check instagram and twitter any time we’d like, as opposed to when social media wasn’t around; people only had T.V and movies as a medium to make comparisons. When habits such as comparing yourself to others and looking at how many likes they get can turn into a mental illness.
In class we also discussed how wearable technology can affect the way our health insurance companies operate. In class we discussed how data from wearable technology can be sent to health insurance companies to ensure that you are doing everything you need to be in order to stay healthy for fear of increasing the cost of your health insurance. However, I don’t think that this will happen anytime soon. This is a huge invasion of privacy that no one would willingly consent to. On the other hand, I think about that enormous power that the health insurance companies have, and if they lobby correctly and to the right people, this could be a scary reality for Americans. This article writes that people may consent to this extreme invasion of privacy if they already have good health habits, and would receive some type of incentive or discount for their “good behavior”. The healthier a health insurance clients are, they less they have to pay out. This is the only realistic way that I can possibly see people consenting to release this amount of private information.
I love listening to the podcast “Reply All“. They often talk about these types of technological dilemmas, whether it be why we should all be using password managers, or if facebook is actually listening to everything we say, and then selling that data. I find it interesting the way they do some investigative reporting, in one episode one of the hosts actually went to India to investigate a call center that was scamming people into buying unnecessary and fraudulent computer virus protection (Episode 102: Long Distance).
Emily 