4 ms·

Therac is one of the reasons I get nervous about "health hacking." Yes, people can verifiably benefit from some of the advancements made in this movement, like

Therac is one of the reasons I get nervous about "health hacking." Yes, people can verifiably benefit from some of the advancements made in this movement, like the DIY diabetic insulin pump, and yes, I prefer to see such advancements be open source than locked up in proprietary designs and trade secrets. And there probably is room in health regulation for trimming the red tape anyway even for innovations originating from the commercial sector. On the other hand, when corners are cut (no hardware interlocks, for example) and edge cases aren't considered, even innocently, then you get things like this. It makes products more expensive to design and more costly to buy and maintain to do the extra engineering. It is certainly a barrier to entry, too. But do we want another case like this because people said "this is good enough"?

jacquesm 8y ago
I posted a link about a insulin pump that could be hacked into remotely. Even if it isn't 'health hacking' because you've bought a product from what you thought was a reputable vendor there are no guarantees that it will be secure and bug free.
- matheusmoreira 8y ago
  https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3262727/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3262727/ > An unauthorized third party can interfere with pump communication and undermine patient safety > we confirmed this through laboratory experiments by sending commands to an insulin pump using an unauthorized remote programmer at a distance of 100 ft > Thus, the specifically identified issues are a security breach that could result in: > (1) changing already-issued wireless pump commands; > (2) generating unauthorized wireless pump commands; > (3) remotely changing the software or settings on the device; > (4) denying communication with the pump device. People can also attack the blood glucose monitors and the data they report to the pump system. Scary.
Digital-Citizen 8y ago
I'd say Brad Kuhn got it right in http://ebb.org/bkuhn/blog/2016/08/13/does-not-kill.html http://ebb.org/bkuhn/blog/2016/08/13/does-not-kill.html including "[Y]our proprietary software has killed people, both quickly and slowly, and your attacks on GPLv3 and software freedom are not only unwarranted, they are clearly part of a political strategy to divert attention from your own industry's bad behavior and graft unfair blame onto FLOSS".

jacquesm 8y ago

I posted a link about a insulin pump that could be hacked into remotely. Even if it isn't 'health hacking' because you've bought a product from what you thought was a reputable vendor there are no guarantees that it will be secure and bug free.

matheusmoreira 8y ago
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3262727/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3262727/ > An unauthorized third party can interfere with pump communication and undermine patient safety > we confirmed this through laboratory experiments by sending commands to an insulin pump using an unauthorized remote programmer at a distance of 100 ft > Thus, the specifically identified issues are a security breach that could result in: > (1) changing already-issued wireless pump commands; > (2) generating unauthorized wireless pump commands; > (3) remotely changing the software or settings on the device; > (4) denying communication with the pump device. People can also attack the blood glucose monitors and the data they report to the pump system. Scary.

Digital-Citizen 8y ago

I'd say Brad Kuhn got it right in http://ebb.org/bkuhn/blog/2016/08/13/does-not-kill.html http://ebb.org/bkuhn/blog/2016/08/13/does-not-kill.html including "[Y]our proprietary software has killed people, both quickly and slowly, and your attacks on GPLv3 and software freedom are not only unwarranted, they are clearly part of a political strategy to divert attention from your own industry's bad behavior and graft unfair blame onto FLOSS".