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How Apple Watch Unexpectedly Measured My Vitals During a Car Crash

22 points by gregcohn 11y ago

gregcohn 11y ago
Not a technically rich article, but interesting conceptually to think about the kinds of data that are going to be routinely captured, uploaded, processed, and aggregated.
- Zikes 11y ago
  My knee-jerk reaction was to think of the privacy implications, but then I realized that most people will jump at the chance to upload their minute-to-minute health status to the cloud.
  - gregcohn 11y ago
    exactly. at some point in the future, deaths are going to be regularly recorded in consumer biometrics, for example.
    - comrh 11y ago
      I would imagine plenty of fatal car crashes have been recorded in the data sent to google about traffic. Data points with incredible reduction in speed and then no further data.
  - click170 11y ago
    This is why I'm so disappointed that I haven't seen any of these devices let you log to your own servers. I'm not saying make it easy, I can hijack a DNS entry and host a server pretending to be you, just open the protocol and let me host the darn server myself. The give-away to their goals, is that these devices you buy are one-time purchases that rely on cloud services. Who's paying for the servers your device is uploading to, and how are they coming up with that money now that they have this wealth of health data on you and millions of other people. I have nightmares about what most business people would do in that situation, and it's why I stopped using my device.
    - Zikes 11y ago
      > I can hijack a DNS entry and host a server pretending to be you Not for long.[1] [1] https://blog.mozilla.org/security/2015/04/30/deprecating-non-secure-http/ https://blog.mozilla.org/security/2015/04/30/deprecating-non...
      - narrowrail 11y ago
        I don't think these watches use a browser to reach their servers (i.e. the cloud).
        Zikes 11y ago
        Once it's the norm for browsers it wouldn't make much sense not to use HTTPS everywhere.
      - click170 11y ago
        The solution to this is very simple: cut off their access entirely. I use an SSL proxy at home and if you attempt to pin certificates such that the local certificate store is ignored or inaccessible. Your device can be guaranteed to not have access from my network. End of story.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
Zikes 11y ago
Interesting to think that first responders may someday be able to check a person's "black box" to be able to assess certain aspects of their condition.
- Xylemon 11y ago
  I don't think "assess" is the word you meant to write haha.
  - ghshephard 11y ago
    as·sess əˈses/Submit verb evaluate or estimate the nature, ability, or quality of.
DigitalSea 11y ago
The thing I found most surprising about this article was during the accident and subsequent setting in on shock, the authors heart rate didn't really increase by that much. I would have expected the heart rate to hit much higher numbers, the shock of being in an accident and the rush of adrenaline kicking in (causing the heart to beat faster). Glad to read that everyone was okay though. I am interested in knowing why the other car swerved in the first place? Was it an accident or were they distracted? The kind of metrics Apple Watch will never be able to tell us.
robmcm 11y ago
If he was using an Android device he would be inundated with calls about the, "recent accident that wasn't your fault"...
jackvalentine 11y ago
It's a pity that the only way to get your own data out of the health app is via (to me, quite inaccessible) XML files. Does anyone have a guide, or any guidance to working with them?
- donkeyd 11y ago
  I don't have any experience in using Excel for XML data myself, but it seems that these articles might help you import the data into Excel: https://support.office.com/en-au/article/Map-XML-elements-to-cells-in-an-XML-Map-ddb23edf-f5c5-4fbf-b736-b3bf977a0c53?ui=en-US&rs=en-AU&ad=AU#__map_xml_elements https://support.office.com/en-au/article/Map-XML-elements-to... https://support.office.com/en-au/article/Import-XML-data-6eca3906-d6c9-4f0d-b911-c736da817fa4 https://support.office.com/en-au/article/Import-XML-data-6ec...
zimpenfish 11y ago
Similar thing for me with my bike crash in 2012 - speed drops to zero, heart rate spikes, then drops whilst I sit around dazed. https://www.strava.com/activities/22929472/analysis/17804/18153 https://www.strava.com/activities/22929472/analysis/17804/18...
vilmosi 11y ago
This is highly suspicious IMO. You almost died in a car crash with your family, yet two days later you wrote how glad you were that you can see a graph of your heart rate? Come on... On the other hand, I could be wrong though, it's just my opinion.

22 points by gregcohn 11y ago

Not a technically rich article, but interesting conceptually to think about the kinds of data that are going to be routinely captured, uploaded, processed, and aggregated.

Zikes 11y ago
My knee-jerk reaction was to think of the privacy implications, but then I realized that most people will jump at the chance to upload their minute-to-minute health status to the cloud.
- gregcohn 11y ago
  exactly. at some point in the future, deaths are going to be regularly recorded in consumer biometrics, for example.
  - comrh 11y ago
    I would imagine plenty of fatal car crashes have been recorded in the data sent to google about traffic. Data points with incredible reduction in speed and then no further data.
- click170 11y ago
  This is why I'm so disappointed that I haven't seen any of these devices let you log to your own servers. I'm not saying make it easy, I can hijack a DNS entry and host a server pretending to be you, just open the protocol and let me host the darn server myself. The give-away to their goals, is that these devices you buy are one-time purchases that rely on cloud services. Who's paying for the servers your device is uploading to, and how are they coming up with that money now that they have this wealth of health data on you and millions of other people. I have nightmares about what most business people would do in that situation, and it's why I stopped using my device.
  - Zikes 11y ago
    > I can hijack a DNS entry and host a server pretending to be you Not for long.[1] [1] https://blog.mozilla.org/security/2015/04/30/deprecating-non-secure-http/ https://blog.mozilla.org/security/2015/04/30/deprecating-non...
    - narrowrail 11y ago
      I don't think these watches use a browser to reach their servers (i.e. the cloud).
      - Zikes 11y ago
        Once it's the norm for browsers it wouldn't make much sense not to use HTTPS everywhere.
    - click170 11y ago
      The solution to this is very simple: cut off their access entirely. I use an SSL proxy at home and if you attempt to pin certificates such that the local certificate store is ignored or inaccessible. Your device can be guaranteed to not have access from my network. End of story.

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

Zikes 11y ago

Interesting to think that first responders may someday be able to check a person's "black box" to be able to assess certain aspects of their condition.

Xylemon 11y ago
I don't think "assess" is the word you meant to write haha.
- ghshephard 11y ago
  as·sess əˈses/Submit verb evaluate or estimate the nature, ability, or quality of.

DigitalSea 11y ago

The thing I found most surprising about this article was during the accident and subsequent setting in on shock, the authors heart rate didn't really increase by that much. I would have expected the heart rate to hit much higher numbers, the shock of being in an accident and the rush of adrenaline kicking in (causing the heart to beat faster). Glad to read that everyone was okay though. I am interested in knowing why the other car swerved in the first place? Was it an accident or were they distracted? The kind of metrics Apple Watch will never be able to tell us.

robmcm 11y ago

If he was using an Android device he would be inundated with calls about the, "recent accident that wasn't your fault"...

jackvalentine 11y ago

It's a pity that the only way to get your own data out of the health app is via (to me, quite inaccessible) XML files. Does anyone have a guide, or any guidance to working with them?

donkeyd 11y ago
I don't have any experience in using Excel for XML data myself, but it seems that these articles might help you import the data into Excel: https://support.office.com/en-au/article/Map-XML-elements-to-cells-in-an-XML-Map-ddb23edf-f5c5-4fbf-b736-b3bf977a0c53?ui=en-US&rs=en-AU&ad=AU#__map_xml_elements https://support.office.com/en-au/article/Map-XML-elements-to... https://support.office.com/en-au/article/Import-XML-data-6eca3906-d6c9-4f0d-b911-c736da817fa4 https://support.office.com/en-au/article/Import-XML-data-6ec...

zimpenfish 11y ago

Similar thing for me with my bike crash in 2012 - speed drops to zero, heart rate spikes, then drops whilst I sit around dazed. https://www.strava.com/activities/22929472/analysis/17804/18153 https://www.strava.com/activities/22929472/analysis/17804/18...

vilmosi 11y ago

This is highly suspicious IMO. You almost died in a car crash with your family, yet two days later you wrote how glad you were that you can see a graph of your heart rate? Come on... On the other hand, I could be wrong though, it's just my opinion.