Should Alexa diagnose Alzheimer's?: Legal and ethical issues with at-home consumer devices

David A Simon; Barbara J Evans; Carmel Shachar; I Glenn Cohen

doi:10.1016/j.xcrm.2022.100692

Should Alexa diagnose Alzheimer's?: Legal and ethical issues with at-home consumer devices

Cell Rep Med. 2022 Dec 20;3(12):100692. doi: 10.1016/j.xcrm.2022.100692. Epub 2022 Jul 25.

Authors

David A Simon¹, Barbara J Evans², Carmel Shachar¹, I Glenn Cohen³

Affiliations

¹ Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology, and Bioethics, Harvard Law School, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA.
² University of Florida Levin College of Law, Gainesville, FL 32611, USA; University of Florida Herbert Wertheim College of Engineering, Gainesville, FL 32611, USA.
³ Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology, and Bioethics, Harvard Law School, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA. Electronic address: [email protected].

Abstract

Voice-based AI-powered digital assistants, such as Alexa, Siri, and Google Assistant, present an exciting opportunity to translate healthcare from the hospital to the home. But building a digital, medical panopticon can raise many legal and ethical challenges if not designed and implemented thoughtfully. This paper highlights the benefits and explores some of the challenges of using digital assistants to detect early signs of cognitive impairment, focusing on issues such as consent, bycatching, privacy, and regulatory oversight. By using a fictional but plausible near-future hypothetical, we demonstrate why an "ethics-by-design" approach is necessary for consumer-monitoring tools that may be used to identify health concerns for their users.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Alzheimer Disease* / diagnosis
Fabaceae*
Privacy