News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:Fitbit's 150B hours of heart data by tomerico on Wednesday September 05, 2018 @03:45AM (#17915865)
While I definitely agree that there are large privacy concerns when collecting health related data, I disagree with the sentiment that it's always a bad idea. There is a huge net benefit to modernizing medicine and getting to an AI that is more accurate then doctors. Creating those datasets is a leap towards that direction.
Re:Fitbit's 150B hours of heart data by saiya-jin on Wednesday September 05, 2018 @04:08AM (#17915986)
Sorry to be impolite but... f*ck that.

If they want true anonymity, then remove at least location part of this (or say with 50km precision). Make it all optional with clear description what user opt for. And have independent yearly audit that confirms this on their core databases.

Anything less that that, and their motives are dirty as stale sewage waters. Why it seems that every company out there is only after as-much-data-as-possible from our lives, ideally all lives on the planet, to somehow monetize them in future? And ideally get bought by some big corp for few billions for owners.

Yet another useless thing I am happy to pass (and I am fitness nerd, but never saw any appeal in these measuring devices - work out hard, have fun, keep doing it often and you will be exceptionally healthy)

Re:Fitbit's 150B hours of heart data by samkellett on Wednesday September 05, 2018 @05:46AM (#17916438)
location is a pretty important metric for diagnostics
Re:Fitbit's 150B hours of heart data by crististm on Wednesday September 05, 2018 @06:04AM (#17916524)
Sarcasm is lost on text. Unless you were serious in which case just reconsider
Re:Fitbit's 150B hours of heart data by TeMPOraL on Wednesday September 05, 2018 @08:49AM (#17917397)
It's not a bad idea if done the right way. Like, I am informed beforehand that this device is collecting all those data for use in medical research by those particular parties, and here is where I can follow this research.

Because otherwise, that data has no business leaving my personal watch<->phone network.

Re:Fitbit's 150B hours of heart data by saagarjha on Wednesday September 05, 2018 @04:05AM (#17915972)
It's not always a bad idea, but collecting data by default in a way that doesn't seem all that anonymized isn't great.