blog/data/2018-08-13-fitnes-tracker.txt

   1 Title: A bit more on privacy respecting health monitor / fitness tracker
   2 Tags: english
   3 Date: 2018-08-13 09:00
   4
   5 <p>A few days ago, I wondered if there are any privacy respecting
   6 health monitors and/or fitness trackers available for sale these days.
   7 I would like to buy one, but do not want to share my personal data
   8 with strangers, nor be forced to have a mobile phone to get data out
   9 of the unit.  I've received some ideas, and would like to share them
  10 with you.
  11
  12 One interesting data point was a pointer to a Free Software app for
  13 Android named
  14 <a href="https://github.com/Freeyourgadget/Gadgetbridge/">Gadgetbridge</a>.
  15 It provide cloudless collection and storing of data from a variety of
  16 trackers.  Its
  17 <a href="https://github.com/Freeyourgadget/Gadgetbridge/#supported-devices">list
  18 of supported devices</a> is a good indicator for units where the
  19 protocol is fairly open, as it is obviously being handled by Free
  20 Software.  Other units are reportedly encrypting the collected
  21 information with their own public key, making sure only the vendor
  22 cloud service is able to extract data from the unit.  The people
  23 contacting me about Gadgetbirde said they were using
  24 <a href="https://us.amazfit.com/shop/bip?variant=336750">Amazfit
  25 Bip</a> and
  26 <a href="http://www.xiaomimi6phone.com/xiaomi-mi-band-3-features-release-date-rumors/">Xiaomi
  27 Band 3</a>.</p>
  28
  29 <p>I also got a suggestion to look at some of the units from Garmin.
  30 I was told their GPS watches can be connected via USB and show up as a
  31 USB storage device with
  32 <a href="https://www.gpsbabel.org/htmldoc-development/fmt_garmin_fit.html">Garmin
  33 FIT files</a> containing the collected measurements.  While
  34 proprietary, FIT files apparently can be read at least by
  35 <a href="https://www.gpsbabel.org">GPSBabel</a> and the
  36 <a href="https://apps.nextcloud.com/apps/gpxpod">GpxPod</a> Nextcloud
  37 app.  It is unclear to me if they can read step count and heart rate
  38 data.  The person I talked to was using a
  39 <a href="https://buy.garmin.com/en-US/US/p/564291">Garmin Forerunner
  40 935</a>, which is a fairly expensive unit.  I doubt it is worth it for
  41 a unit where the vendor clearly is trying its best to move from open
  42 to closed systems.  I still remember when Garmin dropped NMEA support
  43 in its GPSes.</p>
  44
  45 <p>A final idea was to build ones own unit, perhaps by basing it on a
  46 wearable hardware platforms like
  47 <a href="https://learn.adafruit.com/flora-geo-watch">the Flora Geo
  48 Watch</a>.  Sound like fun, but I had more money than time to spend on
  49 the topic, so I suspect it will have to wait for another time.</p>
  50
  51 <p>While I was working on tracking down links, I came across an
  52 inspiring TED talk by Dave Debronkart about
  53 <a href="https://archive.org/details/DavedeBronkart_2010X">being a
  54 e-patient</a>, and discovered the web site
  55 <a href="https://participatorymedicine.org/epatients/">Participatory
  56 Medicine</a>.  If you too want to track your own health and fitness
  57 without having information about your private life floating around on
  58 computers owned by others, I recommend checking it out.</p>
  59
  60 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
  61 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
  62 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>