Australian insurers can’t discriminate against clients on the basis of their health. So why are they doing everything they can to have people feed them sensitive health and fitness data?
If you’re looking for the must-have object for the era of self-optimisation, designed to ensure your life runs as efficiently as possible, look no further than the smartwatch.
In fact, the only thing now standing between insurers and the unimpeded use of health and fitness data collected by smartwatches is industry regulation to prevent discrimination. No insurance company can legally deny you a policy based on data generated by a Fitbit, an Apple Watch or a Garmin. Which makes insurers’ fascination with feeding smartwatch-generated health data into their algorithms all the more intriguing, according to privacy advocates.
Yet the privacy risks that come with the flow of data from wearable technology to insurers don’t tend to attract much media attention; nor does the question if consumers downloading applications or linking devices to insurers are in a position to offer informed consent. Circumventing regulatory restrictions, these rewards are crucial. Australian health insurers are governed by a community rating system – which means that, regardless of health status, age, gender or any other factor, individuals will be charged the same premium as every other member living within their state.
“When a NIB member uses our ‘Well with NIB’ app, we may collect personal information to send communications to our members which contain personalised health information, products, and services,” Close said. ‘We’ve got no means to know how pricing of insurance works because companies keep it completely secret.’Data generated by wearable devices offers insurers a big advantage. Not only can they get to know their customers better, but they can also fine-tune algorithms to profile people in a more detailed way. How those profiles will be used in the future is unclear.
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