Hacker News Reader

Comment by autoexec | Hacker News Reader

Quest Diagnostics is pretty sketchy. They've been busted for fraud, illegal kickbacks, inaccurate tests, privacy violations, etc. They sell every scrap of data they can get away with to third parties including marketers and it's a lot of data (https://www.questdiagnostics.com/our-company/privacy/privacy...) which includes: Professional/employment-related information, products or services purchased/obtained/considered, consumer’s preferences, characteristics, psychological trends, predispositions, behavior, attitudes, intelligence, abilities, and aptitudes. driver’s license/national or state ID number, citizenship status, immigration status, race, national origin, religious or philosophical beliefs, sexual orientation, sex life, precise geolocation, information concerning your health, and genetic information.

View on HN

They've also contacted my emergency contacts in an attempt to collect payment for blood tests when they made a mistake writing down my insurance information... that was already sent to them by the doctor ordering the test. The link to the receipt in the text message listed enough details about the blood tests to deduce some very private information.

I have never in my life seen a more flagrant and willful violation of HIPAA. It's the only time I have ever contacted my state AG or the HHS.

Fully agreed that it's scuzzy, but wouldn't that legally fall under TPO?

They clearly have a very different view of what constitutes an emergency than most of us. Did your AG get back you?

The only information we use to generate your lab req in Quest is: name dob biological sex phone number

I imagine the bulk of your data is collected when you show up for the blood draw. You have a really nice site, but should defiantly try to find and work with a more ethical and trustworthy lab. On the plus side, when they sold your data they probably had a lot of nice things to say about your intelligence, abilities, and aptitudes!

Quest is one of the two major testing companies in the US. (And LabCorp is not much better.)

I understand the sentiment here, but it's like saying "you should definitely try and find and work with a more ethical political party than the [reader's choice: Democrats|Republicans]". Good luck! It's not likely to happen, even if we all wish otherwise.

It looks like those two companies have been buying up competitors left and right for a long time, so no wonder there aren't many other options left out there. Seems like this is an industry that doesn't get a lot of attention, but which is badly in need of oversight and regulation.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com