This was a very simple article here but it continues to show models and algorithms working together and maybe clashing in other areas. The company mentioned is ALR Technologies that joined the insurance lobbying group. Why would they join? Money and selling their product to insurers.
In addition products such as theirs collect data so insurance companies are pretty incentivized to put more of these in place with consumers. Products like this are great with the exception of the big brother affect with the “data selling epidemic” currently in the US that plays havoc with many different areas of healthcare. First of all, trust and that’s a big one and secondly if I can help it I have no great interest in fattening the cash of $1.7 trillion that companies have in cash today. You can watch the video below and it’s kind of long but this type of relationship with device and insurance companies is set up to collect data and make money with it. Here’s the “about” from the America’s Health Insurance Plans..
“America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) is the national trade association representing the health insurance industry.
AHIP’s members provide health and supplemental benefits to more than 200 million Americans through employer-sponsored coverage, the individual insurance market, and public programs such as Medicare and Medicaid. AHIP advocates for public policies that expand access to affordable health care coverage to all Americans through a competitive marketplace that fosters choice, quality and innovation.”
What do trade associations do…lobby. I keep bringing this up and it doesn’t get much coverage elsewhere but we have plenty of these types of connections out there already with data for profit and sale. It’s just too sad that it developed this way with making a buck and selling data out there being so prominent. Walgreens in 2010 made short of $800 million just selling data and they sell to the highest bidder sometimes as along with your prescription data they can also combine that with data on anything else you buy there…
So the more places where the monitoring systems can be installed, the more data for sale they can generate and certainly the alliance with the insurance business here is an incentive to do so. We know already that insurance companies are so addicted right now to every stick of data they can get their hand on that they pay for a lot of data. They even buy your master card and visa charge and debit records. Blue Cross said they were looking for people buying clothes a size larger but remember they have all the data and can query it with anything they have in house, again the data selling epidemic continues. Do you wonder why your rates keep going up? So when is enough data enough? We read all the time about companies that can’t figure out where value comes from with big data.
Insurance Companies Are Buying Up Consumer Spending Data-Time is Here to License and Tax the Data Sellers-As Insurers Sell Tons of Data, Gets Flawed Data When Data Buyers Uses Out of Context Too
So now by affiliating with insurance trade associations and lobbyists we kind of have yet one more angle with getting data for sale…and most have actuary reports on us too predicting how long we 
will live on top of all of the other data. They can buy those from Life Insurance companies who do that for just about anyone they insure. Again it’s really a shame that the business grew this way but it is what it is with data selling not only with insurance companies but banks as well has become such a huge business, with flawed data that nobody looks at except us when it denies us a service, loan etc. and then we are on our own ticket to defend ourselves against the flawed data that has already judged us as guilty.
I still tell all to look for the devices and services that go to an untethered PHR so you can choose what you want to share. When you read all the privacy statements they mean little today and you sign it away half the time anyway. So again, when you are looking at a monitoring system of some kind, especially those recommended from your insurance plan just remember there’s the double edge sword here with all of this. Sure it may function and do what it is programmed to do but it creates data for sale as well for the data addicted health insurance business. If you look at want ads, they are full of openings for mining and analytics jobs with insurers. I just saw one the other day from United wanting a specific individual that will work with police agencies to get data and look for potential losses along with using their in house software. Auditing software does a good job finding fraud patterns but when it comes to a buck carriers will take this to the inth degree with data.
Does the US Government Need a Department of Modeling and Algorithms–Is Data Addiction and Abuse the Next Up and Coming 12 Step Program, Some Classic Posts & Topics Revisited
We end up with data being used out of context as steroid marketing can make a point for any type of software (think bitcoin if you will) and interpretations are geared for making money not ethics and accuracy. At the link below there’s a good video with folks from NASA and other companies discussing quants and data and they say they don’t know what works and where to zero in on big data and so there you go with slanted data as we see from banks and insurers. You can always tell the marketing end anymore when you see a study that claims something will save “trillions”, so that is your keyword as nobody can predict that and if economists would spend a little more time with quants maybe they could be a little more on target. Saving trillions=farce.
Big Data/Analytics If Used Out of Context and Without True Values Stand To Be A Huge Discriminatory Practice Against Consumers–More Honest Data Scientists Needed to Formulate Accuracy/Value To Keep Algo Duping For Profit Out of the Game
Again the time has come to license and excise tax data sellers on the billions they make in profit for automated code that runs and again interesting as stated above to see the affiliations with insurance trade groups and devices..making money with selling data. The videos over at my Algo Duping page help explain some of this as well so you can maybe figure out if you have been duped on a lot of this. BD
Time Has Come to License and Tax the Data Sellers of the Web, Companies, Banks, Social Networks..Any One Making a Profit-Latest Microsoft/Google Privacy War Helping the Cause –Consumers Deserve to Know What Is Being Sold and To Who in a Searchable Format
http://online.wsj.com/article/PR-CO-20130418-907722.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
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