The quantified self certainly has its benefits, allowing us to detect illnesses early–perhaps eventually even anticipate them. We’ll have the ability to monitor our vitals and behavior whenever we like, but corporations may also have their telescope inside our bodies and minds. From Jacob Silverstein at the Baffler:

This month, John Hancock Insurance—whose patriotic namesake might be disappointed that the company is now a wholly owned subsidiary of Canadian giant Manulife Financial—announced that it would distribute rebates to life insurance customers in exchange for access to their fitness monitor and location information.

IBM and Microsoft are marketing their cloud computing services to insurers, offering to crunch their data for them.

Car insurers like Progressive are discovering the value of real-time telematics data, culled from GPS units or special devices that can track whether you brake too hard. (Want to gag a little? Check out this British insurer using information from car computers to encourage motorists to “drive like a girl.”)

This is the first wave of insurance companies capitalizing on the explosion in personal data, and it looks to get worse. Trade publications are awash with rosy stories about the profits to be extracted from modifying premiums not just once or twice a year, but every day. Soon, rates will be adjusted in real time. As one insurance consultant told Forbes, “the healthier you get the lower your premiums go.” The corollary is that if you get sick or injured, or if you do anything that the insurer’s algorithms deem unhealthy, your premiums will increase.•