Should meta data from your mobile device data impact medical claims or influence decisions about care? The future of mobile devices as “collaborating witnesses” in treatment may already be here.
While not stated explicitly in a recent study, Estimation of the total population moving into and out of the 20km evacuation zone during the Fukushima NPP accident as calculated using “Auto-GPS” mobile phone data, potential medical surveillance does raise concerns about how the use of smart devices to monitor population locations and movements will be conducted, the effectiveness, and the ultimate impact on individuals.
After the Fukushima nuclear disaster, chaos was evident in government warnings, damage assessments, radiation release amounts, and calls for evacuation. People who fled the area had no idea how much radiation they were exposed to before they left the impacted area.
In their study, Ryugo S. Hayano and Ryutaro Adachi use a novel approach to better evaluate a population’s radiation doses. They study the logs of GPS-equipped cellphones. Using anonymized GPS meta data from these mobile devices, they were able to estimate evacuation populations, potential radiation exposure, and infer dosages for populations.
Immediately, questions of validity, false positives, and liability arise from these conclusions. Not to mention privacy. What are your thoughts?
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