Can the Hawaii SMART Health Card record your sexual performances and store them in a database?

by Andrew Walden

Governor David Ige didn’t mention sex when announcing, September 8, 2021, a plan to “enable individuals who received their COVID-19 vaccinations in Hawaiʻi to create a state-issued digital Hawaiʻi SMART Health Card that may be used to confirm their vaccination status to businesses and venues that require it.”

But the small print reveals a trail of breadcrumbs leading to your bedroom.

The trail begins with the ‘Vaccine Credential Initiative’ and ‘Commons Project’ mentioned in Ige’s news release:

Hawaiʻi SMART Health Cards follow the format recommended by the Vaccine Credential Initiative and is currently being used by vaccination providers such as CVS.

Businesses and establishments may use a SMART Health Card verifier app to verify status. (The app can be downloaded to any Apple device — iPhone or iPad — or to an Android device to scan the QR code. For the app go to https://thecommonsproject.org/smart-health-card-verifier).

Wired Magazine, August 6, 2021, writes:

Last fall, as it became clear that a Covid vaccine was on the way, several organizations, including Microsoft, MITRE, and the Mayo Clinic … looked to a preexisting open-source project called the SMART health card framework, designed for people to digitally store their health information. This became the basis of a new coalition of tech, health, and government entities called the Vaccine Credential Initiative, or VCI….

The Commons Project, a worldwide organization launched by the Rockefeller Foundation, invites users to “Safely and securely store and share your COVID-19 health information by importing SMART® Health Cards to the CommonHealth or CommonPass apps”

Hawaii SMART Card users will be doing this anytime they enter "establishments (using) a SMART Health Card verifier app to verify status.”

This is where it gets interesting.

The Commons Project explains:

Our platform extends the health data portability model pioneered by Apple Health to the 73% of people around the world who use Android devices.

Apple Health? 

The Apple Health app, built in to the Apple watch, is notorious for sex spying. A Google search for apple health alert during sex produces over 38 million results including:

VICE Magazine 2016: Apple's Health App Now Tracks Sexual Activity, and That's a Big Opportunity

Daily Dot, 2020: The Apple Watch tracks calories burned during sex. What does that mean for data privacy?

Inverse.com: FROM CHEATING TO PREGNANCY REVEALS, WEARABLES KNOW WHAT YOU'RE DOING INTIMATELY

September 3, 2021: Apple Delays Plan to Scan iPhones for Child Sex Abuse Images

This is the system you will interface with every time you use your SMART Health Card.  What will it do with information from your wearables? 

SMART Health IT warns: “You should only share your SMART Health Card information with trusted organizations that tell you what they intend to do with your data and/or if they will keep it. If you are not comfortable with the organization seeing the information in your SMART Health Card, you should not share it.”

Translation: Your data will be misused.  Our lawyers wrote this to present in court as an argument against your lawsuit.

At this point you are probably wondering, ‘What about HIPAA?’

Becker’s Hospital Review September, 2021, asks:

Are vaccine cards on their own protected under HIPAA?

No; HIPAA only applies when medical information is in the hands "of a covered entity," which HHS defines as healthcare providers, health plans and healthcare clearinghouses. HIPAA also applies to business associates of these covered entities.

Moreover, HIPAA is a US law and the SMART Health Card is in international effort.

Chinese interests bought GRINDR to blackmail the Vatican.  What would they do with the SMART Health Card database?

The General Assembly of The Commons Project includes lots of Silicon Valley venture capital guys, (among them the former General Counsel for the Omidiyar Network--so expect fluffy coverage from Civil Beat) and representatives of dozens of countries where HIPAA is not on the books, including multiple representatives from China.

Wired Magazine points out: 

Foreign travel is also increasingly dependent on confirming vaccination status. But it’s not Joe Biden who will demand that you prove yourself before crossing a border—it’s your destination country….

In July, the entire country of Aruba announced that the only proof of vaccination it would accept from visitors is the SMART health card…

…more countries may follow Aruba’s lead and demand those cards for international travelers. Eventually, you may need one simply to get on a plane….

But remember: It’s not a vaccine passport. New York and California (and Hawaii--Editor) aren’t forcing people to download the app. No Big Brother. They, and other VCI participants, are simply offering it to provide a means for anyone to verify their vaccination status on their own initiative. 

Beware anyone using the word ‘simply’.

Get vaxxed to tamp this disease down so it cannot be used as an excuse.  Witless antivaxxers are just being exploited to keep the crisis alive. 

And yes, you do have choices--two of them--to stay out of the database:

Foil a Spy Option 1: Laminate a photocopy of your CDC vax card.  Score it down the middle to fold to the size of a business card.  Then put it in your wallet.

Foil a Spy Option 2: Save a photo of your CDC vax card on your cellphone.

You will have lots of company. 

About 90% of the public are wise to Silicon Valley’s game.  Wired reports: “California launched its Vaccine Record Portal, based on the SMART system, in June….  So far, about (only) 10 percent of the 20 million vaccinated people in the state have downloaded the card.”

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