Today in news that might make you think this whole “technology” thing was a bad idea, Apple’s new health and fitness app Healthbook has leaked. And it opens new and vast vistas of technological creepiness.
9to5mac has a full breakdown of what they know about Healthbook, based off the Passbook app, and boy howdy, this might finally tip the balance to Android for good:
As can be seen in the above images, Healthbook has sections that can track data pertaining to bloodwork, heart rate, hydration, blood pressure, physical activity, nutrition, blood sugar, sleep, respiratory rate, oxygen saturation, and weight… Healthbook will be able to store and track heart rate/pulse data in BPM (beats per minute) as well as blood pressure data… Healthbook can also track a person’s oxygen saturation.
Let’s leave aside, just for a moment, the fact that putting all your medical information on a device that gets stolen a lot is a bad idea, and instead focus on the fact that Apple basically uses the iPhone to track every single habit you have and even where you go. So now, it wants you to fork over, quite literally, data on every breath you take? Who’d agree to this?
This isn’t even getting into the potential implications of what might happen if Apple decides to start selling this data. Imagine getting a rate increase on your health insurance because you put on some weight last month. Or being shoved onto another policy because they think you’re about to have a stroke. Or, if you’re a different breed of paranoid, this data being sold to the government.
Isn’t spitballing our future dystopia fun? Healthbook will likely be arriving sometime this year.