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Healthcare.gov Sends Personal Data To Over a Dozen Tracking Websites
An anonymous reader tips an Associated Press report saying that Healthcare.gov is sending users' personal data to private companies. The information involved is typical ad-related analytic data: "...it can include age, income, ZIP code, whether a person smokes, and if a person is pregnant. It can include a computer's Internet address, which can identify a person's name or address when combined with other information collected by sophisticated online marketing or advertising firms." The Electronic Frontier Foundation confirmed the report, saying that data is being sent from Healthcare.gov to at least 14 third-party domains.
The EFF says, "Sending such personal information raises significant privacy concerns. A company like Doubleclick, for example, could match up the personal data provided by healthcare.gov with an already extensive trove of information about what you read online and what your buying preferences are to create an extremely detailed profile of exactly who you are and what your interests are. It could do all this based on a tracking cookie that it sets which would be the same across any site you visit. Based on this data, Doubleclick could start showing you smoking ads or infer your risk of cancer based on where you live, how old you are and your status as a smoker. Doubleclick might start to show you ads related to pregnancy, which could have embarrassing and potentially dangerous consequences such as when Target notified a woman's family that she was pregnant before she even told them. "
The EFF says, "Sending such personal information raises significant privacy concerns. A company like Doubleclick, for example, could match up the personal data provided by healthcare.gov with an already extensive trove of information about what you read online and what your buying preferences are to create an extremely detailed profile of exactly who you are and what your interests are. It could do all this based on a tracking cookie that it sets which would be the same across any site you visit. Based on this data, Doubleclick could start showing you smoking ads or infer your risk of cancer based on where you live, how old you are and your status as a smoker. Doubleclick might start to show you ads related to pregnancy, which could have embarrassing and potentially dangerous consequences such as when Target notified a woman's family that she was pregnant before she even told them. "
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What does that spell HIPAA
What does that mean! The government should fine itself!
I think if the government needs to fine itself, they should refund the money back to the tax payers for services failed to render.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
You didn't need to be a drooling FoxNews zombie to see that Healthcare.gov was a bad idea.
But the reason it is a bad idea is not that all government does is bad - rather this illustrates why things like this should be managed by a body that is guaranteed to not be in bed with business and is stricly regulated. Whether or not this can be called corruption in the legal sense, it certainly is morally corrupt.
There is no such thing as "a body that is guaranteed to not be in bed with business."
Also, "strictly regulated" often just means "whitewashed by some taxpayer-funded agency with no teeth."
Rather than "strictly regulated" we need "transparent and publicly accountable" in order to resist corruption.
Suggestion: Everyone go report this as a HIPAA violation.
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