OXFORD, Miss. (WLBT) – Nearly everywhere you go, someone is wearing a smartwatch, wireless earbuds, or some other form of wearable technology.
In the coming years, researchers expect these devices to play a pivotal role in healthcare, but this could come with major consequences – like hackers getting access to your confidential information.
For nearly a decade, an assistant professor at the University of Mississippi, Charlie Walter, has tested the level of security in wearable technology and studied ways to further protect your data.
“My job isn’t to steal your data. My job is not to go in and be the hacker. My job is to make everyone safer,” Walter said. “A large part of my job is reporting bugs when I find them. You want the company to fix any problems they have. But a bigger part is just looking for them. If you’re not looking, you’re not going to find anything.”
One of Walter’s main findings is that you get what you pay for.
“The big players – Apple, Samsung, Google, Fitbit – tend to have higher security because they just have more experience. Generally, if you’re getting a very cheap – $20 or less – wearable, it’s probably going to have skimped on the security,” he said.
But even the most secure devices are far from perfect because patching up holes is a constant game of cat and mouse.
“Security is a never-ending war between attackers and defenders. Attackers will always find some new hole they can attack, some new way in, or some new trick. And defenders will always be thinking of new ways to protect it,” he said.
Walter said this presents a major challenge as wearable tech makes its way into the medical field because people’s health data may have to be exposed in order for certain devices to become more secure.
But this potential problem is two-fold.
“There are a lot of laws associated with medical data that you have to make sure you’re complying with. Generally, to get approval, you have to go through the FDA, and the FDA doesn’t approve things lightly. They take a lot of time making sure things are correct, verifiable, and guaranteed to do fairly well,” Walter said. “That means if you need a security update – how fast can you get that approval? How fast can you go through all of that? It’s kind of not known right now.”
Walter said for the most part, these so-called “attackers” are going after people’s data and not trying to cause physical harm. But when you start thinking about what could happen if someone hacked into an insulin pump or a pacemaker, the potential consequences could be lethal.
“I have a friend who had an insulin pump physically attached as a wearable because he’s afraid of needles. But if someone can get access to that, that’s really, really dangerous and not just from a data collection standpoint. What happens if you can prevent insulin from being administered or force the insulin to be dumped all at once?” he said. “Fortunately, to my knowledge, no one has been able to get into a wearable insulin pump and force all of the insulin into someone’s body, but it’s certainly a risk. And understandably, we need to have really, really good security for those devices to make sure they’re safe.”
Don’t be mistaken – Walter wants to see wearable tech play a more vital role in healthcare.
In fact, he said it’s not playing as big of a role as it should be. He expects that to change in the years to come.
“Ideally, as we move forward, you want medical wearables in the home so that people don’t have to go to the doctor unless they are really, really in bad shape,” he said. “You’re monitoring your health from home, you’re using telehealth to talk with the doctor, still, and you’re in a safe, familiar environment. That way, we’re able to lessen the burden on hospitals and make sure they’re only really used for extreme cases.”
Walter said one of the major reasons why medical wearables are gradually making their way into the industry is because of the aforementioned security concerns.
“A lot of wearables need to have a certain level of security. Specifically, any medical wearable has to be able to pass HIPAA, which is the law that deals with medical data in general. That’s a hard bar to clear, and it should be a hard bar to clear. You don’t want your data exposed,” he said. “But that also makes things a lot slower and ends up making it more difficult to get these wearables into the medical field and into people’s hands.”
Another challenge companies will face as wearables become more popular in the medical industry is walking the line between having top-notch security and being user-friendly.
That line is even finer when considering the elderly who would likely benefit from medical wearables the most.
“The elderly tend to be the least tech-savvy as a group, but they’re also the ones who need the most medical attention on average,” he said. “Having a device that they have to be able to set up, figure out how to get working, and maintain safety is difficult. Generally, the easier something is to use, the less safe it is to use.”
Walter is working on an app that aims to protect people with wearable devices and also alerts those within a certain area if a threat is detected.
For now, he wants you to know that wearables are generally safer than most people expect.
However, Walter also says it’s important to not put security on the back burner when researching a new device.
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