About a week ago I posted Google Storing Medical Records and discussed this emerging service. At the time I was concerned that the medical information Google is storing would not be governed by the same HIPAA regulations that ensure the privacy of this data. I was also concerned that Google could sell this data to biotechnology or pharmaceutical companies who would then use it for direct marketing purposes.
One key source of revenue that I completely forgot is ad revenue and now I've just read a post on the Bits blog in the technology section of the New York Times that reminded me of this potential gold mine. Google's chief executive, Eric Schmidt, stated that "at first there would be no ads on the service", but a Google spokesman also stated that "the company may well put ads on future versions of the service".
The blog post also was quick to point out that "parts of Google Health, like most everything Google does, will have a box that can be used to launch a Web search. The search results pages, of course, will have Google’s standard ads." and the post also mentioned the following:
"One of the most interesting aspects of Google’s business model is that the company can play this totally clean — no ads on any Google health pages and no use of the medical data for any commercial purposes – and still make a mint from medical ads."
I don't think I'd trust my medical information to Google and I get enough junk mail, cold calling and spam as it is.
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