May 2017

IEEE Technology Policy and Ethics: May 2017

Future Directions in Online Healthcare Consumerism Policy Making: Exploring Trust Attributes of Online Healthcare Information

by Ankur Chattopadhyay and Katie L. Turkiewicz

As originally published in the March issue of the IEEE Internet Policy Newsletter

The internet profoundly impacts the way people search for, utilize, and communicate about healthcare information. Eight out of 10 Americans report searching online for healthcare information. More specifically, 83% indicated using the internet to look up a particular disease or a medical problem. There is an enormous amount of Online Health Information (OHI) available for users. However, there is lack of standardization in setting guidelines of credibility standards for OHI. In other words, there are no standard mechanisms or policies for regulating online healthcare consumerism to help users make ‘trust’ decisions while using OHI. Although, active OHI users make such ‘trust’ judgments all the time, there is no standard policy driven method or approach to comply with the rationale of making such decisions.

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Cybersecurity Law and Emerging Technologies Part 1: The Federal Trade Commission, Reasonable Security Measures and IoT

by Emile Loza de Siles

Emerging technologies and their development, deployment, and business models accelerate more rapidly than do the important legal frameworks needed to govern those technologies and activities.  Cybercriminals likewise run rampant and push the need for meaningful cybersecurity laws forward with urgency.  In this Part 1 article, I discuss cybersecurity law as it applies to emerging technologies with a specific focus on the Internet of Things (“IoT”).  Cooperative efforts between the technology and legal communities are greatly needed to better inform the development of technically-mindful cyber laws and of the technologies that are reshaping humanity and society.

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