Just wondering
"... developers can access the data and leverage it to create entirely new applications.”
How much will they pay me to let them view and use data from my body?
Samsung has taken the wraps off a reference design with the idea of “sensorising” the human body, and it's neither a wrist-phone nor a smartwatch. Imagine, if you like, replacing “machines that go ping*” with wires or sensors communicating with a wristband, and you've got a start on its Simband concept. As Samsung says, it's …
If this was being suggested by a medical devices company, it would need to go through all sorts of research approval. Personal data, storage who knows where, the ability to diagnose things about the person that the person does not know about ...
Insurance companies will be looking at this with great interest. The world isn't going to be better for it.
Eat [brand] chocolate. It really does give you orgasms.
Come to [brand] themepark. Our rides are so scary they give 17% of people heart palpitations and cause 9% to wet themselves.
You've got mail. "We noticed you haven't had an orgasm in the last 316 days - here's a voucher for 25% off [brand] chocolate."
So there was this guy who sailed his boat to all sorts of places, no relative of mine but a friend. Someone was discussing with me how my sailor friend could maintain a log of his health while carrying out various tasks on his boat. I suggested we should [ahem] Simband the Sailor.
Mine's the one with soggy pockets...
This sounds like it would be collecting the same sort of data that a polygraph does -- BP, respiration, skin conductivity, heart rate, etc. I'm sure that this would be very convenient for organizations that might want to ask one embarrassing questions, since they wouldn't need to hook you up to any distracting equipment (nor, presumably, ask your permission to do so). Better still, if the wristband stores data locally between uploads to the cloud, they would have a really good set of baseline readings for you.
...Or am I misunderstanding how this thing would work...?
All these cloud centric IoT (Internet of Things) turds need to get real about personal and system security because the cloud will likely never be fully secure. There needs to be one or more dedicated gateway/firewall nodes which a zoned set of IoT must talk through (no, not an internet gateway/router/firewall) which decides what each of these devices can talk to, and provides encrypted connection tunnels or encrypted data wrappers to secure /all/ data transfers.
All IoT should damned well be able to run with only a local computer and not need to send any data to a cloud server, for any functionality, for any data which may compromise security e.g. that includes /all/ exercise and medical devices, including weight, movement, and cycling computers!
I will never buy any device which requires a remote cloud server for configuration or use, because it is a point access or support failure, and an open security sore; designers who do this should be made to suffer! I tolerate ebook and Android devices because I can use these off-line.