The query “what is a thought?” is not any longer exclusively a philosophical one. Like all the things else that’s measurable, our thoughts are increasingly being answered technologically, with the info captured by tracking brain waves. This breakthrough also means the info is commercializable, and captured brain data is already being bought and sold by firms within the wearable consumer technology space, with few protections for users.
In response, Colorado recently passed a first-in-the-nation privacy law designed to guard these rights. The law falls under the present Colorado Consumer Protection Act, which goals to “protect the privacy of individuals' personal information by establishing certain requirements for businesses that process personal information.” [and] includes additional protection for sensitive data.”
The Key wording in Colorado law is the extension of the term “sensitive data” to incorporate “biological data” – including quite a few biological, genetic, biochemical, physiological and neural properties.
Elon Musk's Neuralink is essentially the most famous example of how technology is embedded within the human mind, even though it isn’t alone on this area. Paradromics is, alongside devices that Speech to stroke patients and helped amputees move prostheses with their thoughts. All of those products are medical devices that should be implanted and are protected by the strict privacy protections of HIPAA. Colorado's law focuses on the fast-growing area of consumer technology and devices that don’t require medical intervention, do not need comparable protections, and could be purchased and used without medical oversight of any kind.
There are dozens of firms making wearable technology that captures brainwaves (also often called neural data). On Amazon alone, there are pages of products, from sleep masks that claim to optimize deep sleep or promote lucid dreaming, to headbands that promise to enhance concentration, to biofeedback headsets that take your meditation session to the following level. These products, by design and necessity, capture neural data through using small electrodes that provide readings of brain activity, with some delivering electrical pulses to influence brain activity.
There are virtually no laws governing the best way to handle all this brain data.
“We've entered the world of science fiction here,” said Colorado Rep. Cathy Kipp, the bill's lead sponsor. “As with all advances in science, there have to be guardrails.”
“ChatGPT moment” for consumer brain technology
A current study A study by the NeuroRights Foundation found that 29 of 30 firms examined that make wearable brainwave recording technology “do not impose any significant restrictions on this access.”
“This revolution in consumer neurotechnology is centered around the increasing ability to capture and interpret brain waves,” said Dr. Sean Pauzauskie, medical director of the NeuroRights Foundation. Electroencephalography devices, a technology available to consumers, are “a multibillion-dollar market that will double in the next five years,” he said. “In the next two to five years, it's not unlikely that neurotechnology could have a ChatGPT moment.”
How much data could be collected is determined by several aspects, however the technology is advancing rapidly and could lead on to an exponential increase in applications, with the technology increasingly incorporating AI. Apple has already Patents filed for AirPods with brain sensors.
“Brain data is too important to go unregulated. It reflects the inner workings of our brains,” said Rafael Yusuf, professor of biological sciences and director of the NeuroTechnology Center at Columbia University, in addition to chairman of the NeuroRights Foundation and a number one figure within the neurotech ethics organization. Morningside Group“The brain is not just another organ in the body,” he added. “We need to engage private actors to ensure that they create a responsible framework for innovation, because the brain is the sanctuary of our minds.”
According to Pauzauskie, the worth for firms lies in interpreting or decoding the brain signals captured by wearable technologies. As a hypothetical example, he gave: “If you were wearing earbuds with brain sensors, Nike would not only know from your browsing history that you were looking for running shoes, but could now also know how interested you were while browsing.”
A wave of laws protecting biological privacy could also be needed
The issue raised by the Colorado law could lead on to a wave of comparable laws that pays increased attention to the convergence of rapidly evolving technologies and the commercialization of user data. In the past, consumer rights and protections have lagged behind innovation.
“Perhaps the best and most current analogies on the topic of technology and privacy are the Internet and the consumer genetic revolution, which has largely gone unchecked,” Pauzauskie said.
The same development could occur if progress continues unabated in the gathering and commercialization of consumer brain data. Hacking, corporate profiteering, consistently changing privacy agreements for users and little to no laws protecting that data are all major risks, Pauzauskie said. Under the Colorado Privacy Act, brain data is subject to the identical privacy rights as fingerprints.
According to Professor Farinaz Koushanfar and Associate Professor Duygu Kuzum of UC San Diego's Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, it continues to be too early to grasp the constraints of the technology and the extent of doubtless invasive data collection.
Tracking neural data could mean tracking a wide selection of cognitive processes and functions, including thoughts, intentions and memories, they wrote in a joint statement sent via email. In extreme cases, tracking neural data could mean directly accessing medical information.
The sheer range of possibilities alone poses an issue. “There are still too many unknowns in this area and that is worrying,” they write.
If these laws grow to be widespread, Koushanfar and Kuzum say firms may don’t have any alternative but to revise their current organizational structure. They may have to appoint recent compliance officers and implement methods equivalent to risk assessment, third-party audits and anonymization as mechanisms for setting requirements for the entities involved.
On the patron side, Colorado's law and all subsequent efforts represent vital steps to raised educate users and provides them the tools they should review their rights and assert them in the event that they experience a violation.
“The Data Protection Act [in Colorado] in the sector of neurotechnology could represent a rare exception where rights and regulations prevail over any widespread abuse or misuse of consumer data,” Pauzauskie said.
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