from the all-the-better-to-sell-ads-to-you-with dept.
Google has access to detailed health records on tens of millions of Americans
Google quietly partnered last year with Ascension—the country's second-largest health system—and has since gained access to detailed medical records on tens of millions of Americans, according to a November 11 report by The Wall Street Journal.
The endeavor, code-named "Project Nightingale," has enabled at least 150 Google employees to see patient health information, which includes diagnoses, laboratory test results, hospitalization records, and other data, according to internal documents and the newspaper's sources. In all, the data amounts to complete medical records, WSJ notes, and contains patient names and birth dates.
The move is the latest by Google to get a grip on the sprawling health industry. At the start of the month, Google announced a deal to buy Fitbit, prompting concerns over what it will do with all the sensitive health data amassed from the popular wearables. Today's news will likely spur more concern over health privacy issues.
Neither Google nor Ascension has notified patients or doctors about the data sharing. Ascension—a Catholic, non-profit health system—includes 34,000 providers who see patients at more than 2,600 hospitals, doctor offices, and other facilities across 21 states and the District of Columbia.
[...] Both Google and Ascension said that the project is compliant with federal health information privacy protections and is "underpinned by a robust data security and protection effort."
Health privacy experts told WSJ that the project appears to be legal under the federal Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA). As the newspaper notes, the law "generally allows hospitals to share data with business partners without telling patients, as long as the information is used 'only to help the covered entity carry out its health care functions.'"
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Lawmakers want HHS to revise health privacy law to require warrants:
All of the big pharmacy chains in the US hand over sensitive medical records to law enforcement without a warrant—and some will do so without even running the requests by a legal professional, according to a congressional investigation.
The revelation raises grave medical privacy concerns, particularly in a post-Dobbs era in which many states are working to criminalize reproductive health care. Even if people in states with restrictive laws cross state lines for care, pharmacists in massive chains, such as CVS, can access records across borders.
Lawmakers noted the pharmacies' policies for releasing medical records in a letter dated Tuesday to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Xavier Becerra. The letter—signed by Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), and Rep. Sara Jacobs (D-Calif.)—said their investigation pulled information from briefings with eight big prescription drug suppliers.
All eight of the pharmacies said they do not require law enforcement to have a warrant prior to sharing private and sensitive medical records, which can include the prescription drugs a person used or uses and their medical conditions. Instead, all the pharmacies hand over such information with nothing more than a subpoena, which can be issued by government agencies and does not require review or approval by a judge.
[...] For now, HIPAA regulations grant patients the right to know who is accessing their health records. But, to do so, patients have to specifically request that information—and almost no one does that. "Last year, CVS Health, the largest pharmacy in the nation by total prescription revenue, only received a single-digit number of such consumer requests," the lawmakers noted.
"The average American is likely unaware that this is even a problem," the lawmakers said.
Originally spotted on Schneier on Security.
Related:
- Websites Selling Abortion Pills are Sharing Sensitive Data With Google
- Meta Faces Lawsuit for Allegedly Collecting Patient Health Data Without Consent
- Google has Access to Detailed Health Records on Tens of Millions of Americans
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Rosco P. Coltrane on Tuesday November 12 2019, @08:44PM (7 children)
to stay in good shape and not visit a doctor.
(Score: 3, Funny) by DannyB on Tuesday November 12 2019, @09:13PM (6 children)
Stay in good shape. Age will catch up with you anyway. Sooner or later you'll see doctors.
Don't believe you'll be young forever. Age catches up with you faster than you can believe.
I remember years ago telling my daughter when she started high school that the next four years would go by so fast she wouldn't believe it. On graduation day she could look back and realize how quickly it all past. I reminded her of it later, and she agreed. (The same advice I had been given, btw.)
Just remember that Google will keep you safe from Facebook gathering all of your personal information.
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Rosco P. Coltrane on Tuesday November 12 2019, @09:16PM (4 children)
Very sarcastic. It's like having to choose between the plague and cholera...
(Score: -1, Spam) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 12 2019, @10:20PM (2 children)
Because they're doing a good job of fucking you in the ass either way.
Also Steve Jobs was a homo, it's the only was to explain his pancreatic cancer!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 12 2019, @10:52PM (1 child)
Someone is upset they can't afford their colonoscopy co-pay!!
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Thursday November 14 2019, @12:54AM
Colonoscopy can detect colon cancer, but it's not likely to detect pancreatic cancer.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 13 2019, @01:39AM
Shover Robot: Don't trust the Pusher Robot. He is malfunctioning. I will protect you!
Pusher Robot: .... etc
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday November 13 2019, @01:48AM
Seeing doctors, only one step better than seeing dead people.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 4, Interesting) by tizan on Tuesday November 12 2019, @09:45PM (1 child)
Sadly everybody does that and they get away under the umbrella that they are using Google or Facebook for analytics to provide you better service.
Saw that Taxact for example will send something to facebook while you are filling different tax forms.
It is interesting though how private companies gets away with it. Imagine the government, which is another branch of Coorporate America, doing this ?
oh wait ...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 13 2019, @05:35AM
cf. https://pi-hole.net/ [pi-hole.net]
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Wednesday November 13 2019, @12:01AM (3 children)
If anyone's cloud, braintrust, codebase, and information selection and categorization experience can mine a dataset that size to pull out something that will help people, Google is a good shot to do it.
I'm ok with them overlaying annual dosage graphs on my personalized Cialis-Viagra-rhino-horn ads if they could mine and finely predict serious or emergency healthcare needs across time/space/demographics axes -- that's a tradeoff I'm willing to accept.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday November 13 2019, @01:21AM (2 children)
I reject any justification for the advertising industry, for starters. I reject the advertising industry's presumption that it is somehow "entitled" to data of any sort. And, I seriously object to any idea that they should be able to project the health care needs of any individual.
What I see is a livestock ranch, where every aspect of an animal's life is carefully documented in pursuit of profit. Every penny spent on an animal is carefully budgeted, right up until the animal is slaughtered for it's meat, fur, bones, and everything except it's squeal. While I may have been a prized stud at one point in my life, I refuse to be sent to the glue factory in my old age.
(Score: 3, Touché) by c0lo on Wednesday November 13 2019, @01:51AM (1 child)
They aren't monetizing the squeal yet?
Now, it smell like a business opportunity here! (grin)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Wednesday November 13 2019, @11:45PM
Apparently it's been a long-term problem [pork.org].
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 13 2019, @01:49AM (1 child)
I quit going to confession because I don't trust the sound proofing of their boxes (the cute woman next in line at the retreat always hears too much info about me)
As of today, I quit going to doctors because I can't trust them from leaking info
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday November 13 2019, @03:22PM
Soundproofing would be a good thing for confessionals, to get the acoustics right, for the microphones.
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 13 2019, @03:39PM (1 child)
I don't want a reward, compensation, and don't want to profit from a lawsuit.
I just want the CEO and other executives punished for violating the trust model we are required to have for the doctor/patient/health care model to work. I want them punished. Punished so badly that non-profits and shareholder value alike have reason to choose patient and user privacy over whatever value they derived from selling out the individual and calling it good.
If I can't opt-out, then by god I want to make sure they can't get out of jail free, either. Oh wait, it was a religious medical institution that sold out the flock--for free. I guess god is on their side.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 13 2019, @09:03PM
So what you're saying is that you don't want to see health care move forward by trying to coordinate data. I see.
Arrangements like these rarely have jack shit to do anything with individuals. They really don't care that little Bobby has pee pee cancer or that you have hemorrhoids. They DO care about finding connections like when X percent of people with hemorrhoids and had Virus X end up developing colon cancer. They do care about when 75% of people on drug X live 5 years longer and 95% on drug Y lived 5 years longer that they can recommend people use drug Y - although that comparison is available easily with data today and doesn't require big data.
Now, it is possible that this arrangement actually used people's names. That's not illegal. Although it would be unusual for an instance like this when they don't need to know who you are, only that they know that the same individual's results go through the system. In other words, it is equally unlikely (unless I read something in TFA) that they know who you are.
All of this is a long-winded way of saying that the story hasn't given nearly enough information to know if you should be concerned or if you should lighten up.