- cross-posted to:
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- cross-posted to:
- [email protected]
- [email protected]
Software that controls your body should always respect your freedom. This article is a recap of scandals of medical devices, like hearing aids, insulin pumps, bionic eyes, and pacemakers, and what we can learn from them. It’s astonishing: you wouldn’t expect these devices to be run by software in such a way that they can leave you completely helpless.
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It should also respect your PRIVACY! There are numerous articles about CPAP machines transmitting your data to not only your doctor but also your insurance company, WITHOUT your consent. Possibly your employer as well. If your insurance company decides you’re “not complying” and using your CPAP machine enough, they’ll take it away from you. Your employer could fire you.
Having a sleep apnea diagnosis can also limit you from certain jobs, and can make it harder to get life insurance. In some ways it feels like you’re not a free man anymore.
Why are they even connected to the internet?
I can’t with this article… there’s a very legitimate argument to be made here, but instead they are whining that stuff stopped working after an iOS update. If you’re running something life-critical you do not install every single update the moment it comes out.
I couldn’t disagree more with you. If you are running something REAL life critical the moment there is a patch you install it and deploy as fast as possible. And if it contains any severe patch it is even the vendor who recalls all the equipment with service bulletin and advisory letters.
With life critical you don’t wait the bug to appear because It maybe too late to avoid deadly consequences.
No. If you’re working with life-critical systems, you only apply patches that are relevant to you. For example, an implantable insulin pump with Bluetooth capability. If there’s a patch that changes the Bluetooth functionality, but you don’t use that functionality, there’s no point in applying the patch.
Then we disagree. Think about it, you’re patching the OS so what you now have is an untested configuration, and you’ve replaced a working system to get there, on the theory that you might be preventing an unknown bug in the future.
In one instance the vendor even explicitly recommends disabling OS updates until they have tested them.
Keeping a life critical device up to date sounds necessary, to the contrary.
Not if the existing software functions properly. If there’s a fix in it you need then sure, once the vendor has tested and approved it you should migrate.
Depends if it is internet enabled (which most are now a days). If that patch is for a 0fay exploit I don’t want ransomeware for pacemakers.
There’s a reason why Google and Apple let developers test out pre-release versions of their OSes months before the release. Companies which don’t test their apps out to prepare for new versions are at fault, nothing else.
I ran an iPhone for many years and never updated anything at all. The apps were updated automatically.
Edit: Ah, you’re talking about an iOS update. Forgive my lack of reading comprehension. Apps that have been automatically updated have been known to stop working, however.
No worries. I clearly should have articulated my point better. I’m always worried about over explaining or sounding pendantic.
I’m always worried about over explaining or sounding pendantic.
That makes two of us :)
