Users willing to sacrifice privacy amid coronavirus: report

Yahoo Finance's Akiko Fujita discusses the privacy concerns amid the coronavirus outbreak, and how some users are willing to give up privacy in the hopes to speed up recovery from the pandemic.

Video Transcript

MYLES UDLAND: All right, Akiko, I know you're looking at kind of some stories on what life in America here may look like just because of how other countries have had to change privacy measures or simply follow privacy measures that, here in the States, we would say, you know, I'm not going to let you take my temperature when I go into a building and get on a flight. But it does seem like our privacy and what our health data-- how our health data is made available to others is probably going to have to change on the other side of this.

AKIKO FUJITA: Yeah, you're right about that, Myles. You know, in this rush to try and contain the virus globally, what we have seen are pretty incredible surveillance measures that have been taken. It really does vary by country to country. But I think the conversation we're hearing now is, you know, are we seeing this trade-off between privacy and safety, and what's going to be waiting on the other end of that?

Going country by country, I mean, China obviously has taken the most extreme measures. And we have talked about the surveillance measures that were put in place, you know, the apps that tracked the people who actually had the coronavirus to make sure they were staying indoors. But in places like South Korea, the location history of every person who contracted the virus, that was detected as well.

Singapore, for example, is taking one of the more extreme measures, I would argue, outside of China. The Ministry of Health, they're posting information online of those vir-- those patients that tested positive, including the relationships they have to other patients. They've also got the smartphone app for citizens that will help authorities locate where they have been.

And then you a place like Hong Kong, where they are making sure every person who is coming in from abroad is now having to wear a bracelet, a monitoring bracelet that essentially ensures that you do not leave your house for 14 days of quarantine. And we should point out today we got this word from that stimulus bill on the hill there. The CDC now setting up a surveillance and data collection system to track the spread of the virus.

And so we don't know the extent of the surveillance on that front. That's still to be determined. But I think there are serious questions that are waiting on the other end of all of this, whenever that may be, about how much we're willing to trade off our privacy in order to ensure that at least we stay safe and we prevent this from becoming an even bigger public health crisis.

ANDY SERWER: Well, that's what I was going to ask you, Akiko, was just that last point. I mean, what do you think the appetite in the United States is for that kind of thing? I mean, obviously, we have the capability, given that we have companies like Google, Facebook, Amazon, et cetera, that are so well versed in tracking and trying to figure out our every move and whim and desire. And they, in partner with the US government, could do a very effective job, but what do you think could actually happen here?

AKIKO FUJITA: Yeah. I mean, you get the sense that there is tolerance for anonymized data. So in other words, you know, there are companies that are going to be tracking your location on your smartphone to determine where the crowds are. You know, cities like New York where there is a lock-down, are there still crowds gathering?

I think there's a tolerance for that. But if you look at some of these countries in Asia, and I would add Israel to the list as well-- because they've taken some pretty significant surveillance measures-- I'm not sure there is going to be that trade-off here in the US, that they're willing to give up their specific data that allows the government, that allows these companies to track exactly who you are, who you are actually interacting with.

But the flip side, Andy, to that would be that, look, we're kind of in a moment of panic right now, right? And you look at-- everybody's behavior is changing because they're trying to look out for themselves. They're worried about their safety. And in that moment of panic, we could see that trade-off, and I would argue that that's kind of the tricky part right now. That once you do that trade-off, it's going to be hard to pull everything back again.

JEN ROGERS: Akiko, do you think there is any middle ground where we would see certain institutions maybe subscribe to this-- schools or hospitals or maybe, you know, a place of work, and it would be on an opt-in basis? Is there some thought that that could be a middle ground that people would find acceptable?

AKIKO FUJITA: Yeah, that is a potential middle ground. You know, we were actually speaking yesterday to a smart thermometer company, Kinsa, which has, over the last few years, been able to accurately detect where the flu outbreaks were going to be. And, essentially, what you have is that thermometer that you use is tied to an app that they have that shows you where the hot spots are right now.

And the argument on that front is that when you know where the hot-spots are and you know where to send the test-- and so you can get ahead of it. Because what we're seeing right now are, sure, testing kits are being made available, but the tests aren't coming back for a week, sometimes two weeks. And so on that level, that doesn't identify exactly who you are, but it does allow a company to tap into the data that you're measuring. I think that level is still acceptable.

And Kinsa did say they have been in talks with the CDC about partnering on that front. It's when you start to get onto a very granular level that goes beyond the anonymity of the data that's collected right now, that it identifies directly who you are, that, I think, Americans are still a little uncomfortable with.

MYLES UDLAND: Yeah. And, you know, it's funny, Akiko, you've done so much work in the last couple of months about security and the Huawei lawsuit. And you kind of realize now, like, on the one hand, I'm sitting here saying, why can't they just track everybody? On the other hand, I guess there was a little bit of a fail-safe built in to some extent, that I am mostly anonymous. Because I'm not getting texts telling me-- I mean, I'm getting texts from the state of New York, but I'm not getting texts from Apple saying, "Why are you x number of blocks from your apartment," so on and so forth?

AKIKO FUJITA: Yeah. I mean, the flip side, you are hearing people in the US say, "Look how it worked in China." Sure, those were very extreme measures that were taken. I mean, you saw some people getting dragged out of their home at the height of the epidemic. But the government knew exactly who these people were. And they had the apps to show exactly what areas to avoid, because you knew where those people who had the positive tests were going.

So if you were not positive, you would avoid some of those areas. And so there is the flip argument to it. And we have heard that in the US. Some experts who came out and then said, "That's what it's going to take to contain the virus." I'm just not sure that on a very broad level Americans are comfortable with that kind of surveillance yet.

MYLES UDLAND: Yeah. Certainly a very interesting conundrum, I think, for all of us as we kind of process what happens now and then what happens next.