Activision Blizzard is reportedly giving its employees gift cards in exchange for anonymized...

[Polycount]

WTF?! Last week, we talked about IBM's almost-Orwellian AI that can predict when a given employee is about to quit with "95 percent" accuracy. If that wasn't odd enough for you, one of Activision Blizzard's recently-uncovered business practices might fit the bill.

As reported by The Washington Post on Tuesday, Activision Blizzard has been working with family planning and wellness app maker Ovia to give their female employees access to the company's pregnancy tracking services.

On the surface, there's not anything particularly unusual about that. What does make the situation a bit strange is that Activision Blizzard asks for the anonymized data generated by the apps.

Apparently, this data includes information gained from the point an employee first tries to conceive a baby all the way to "early motherhood" and beyond, provided the individual tracks their data for that long.

Activision Blizzard compensates its employees for their cooperation by giving them $1 for every day the app is used. These funds go into gift cards that can then be used at the employee's discretion.

Privacy concerns aside, the main thought on many peoples' minds following this report seems to be "Why?" - it's a fair question, but not one we have a solid answer to at the moment. For now, all we have to go off of is statements given to the Post by Milt Ezzard, Activision Blizzard's current vice president of global benefits:

Each time we introduced something, there was a bit of an outcry: ‘You’re prying into our lives.' But we slowly increased the sensitivity of stuff, and eventually people understood it’s all voluntary, there’s no gun to your head, and we’re going to reward you if you choose to do it.

People’s sensitivity has gone from, ‘Hey, Activision Blizzard is Big Brother,’ to, ‘Hey, Activision Blizzard really is bringing me tools that can help me out.’

It's worth noting that this is not the first time Activision Blizzard has asked their employees to track their health in exchange for some sort of reward (financial or otherwise). Apparently, they've had similar systems in place for obtaining exercise, sleep, diet, and other data since around 2014.

Permalink to story.

https://www.techspot.com/news/79608-activision-blizzard-reportedly-giving-employees-gift-cards-exchange.html

 

[MilwaukeeMike]

Paying your employees for your health data isn't unusual... my company does it. The data allows the company to help provide tools for people to stay healthy and prevent problems. Paying employees to collect the data makes it voluntary, but you still get good participation.

Preventing an issue is WAY cheaper than curing one. Plus, with a healthier workforce you save on health insurance, and everyone prefers lower insurance rates. The company saves money, the employees save money, people miss less work, and everyone's better off.

Healthy moms and new babies are right at the top of the list when it comes to people to focus on. It's a very important and predictable health care need. And who doesn't want healthy moms and babies!?

 

[psycros]

Paying your employees for your health data isn't unusual... my company does it. The data allows the company to help provide tools for people to stay healthy and prevent problems. Paying employees to collect the data makes it voluntary, but you still get good participation.

Preventing an issue is WAY cheaper than curing one. Plus, with a healthier workforce you save on health insurance, and everyone prefers lower insurance rates. The company saves money, the employees save money, people miss less work, and everyone's better off.

Healthy moms and new babies are right at the top of the list when it comes to people to focus on. It's a very important and predictable health care need. And who doesn't want healthy moms and babies!?

Sorry, but I see NO conceivable reason they would need detailed reproductive data as part of an overall health and wellness program except for one possibility: fine-tuning their policies regarding maternity leave. In my experience all that ever amounts to is women receiving less time off to recover from pregnancy and bond with their newborn. And I just realized I used the word "conceivable". SIGH..

 

[MilwaukeeMike]

Sorry, but I see NO conceivable reason they would need detailed reproductive data as part of an overall health and wellness program except for one possibility: fine-tuning their policies regarding maternity leave. In my experience all that ever amounts to is women receiving less time off to recover from pregnancy and bond with their newborn. And I just realized I used the word "conceivable". SIGH..

Ha, yes, good one...

And good point, so I looked it up. Activision doesn't have maternity leave, they have parental leave, which means both men and women get 8 weeks paid leave when they have or adopt a baby. (page 42)
https://hub.activisionblizzard.com/sfc/servlet.shepherd/version/download/068C0000002x6fKIAQ

I'd give them the benefit of the doubt they actually care about healthy moms and babies. When looking for the benefits I found a few links that showed they score very high on surveys and the like as a good place to work.

 

[PEnnn]

Maybe they have a "Truman Show" project in mind.....

PS: Good movie actually (An insurance salesman discovers his whole life is actually a reality TV show.)

 

[EClyde]

Wellness...It's BS. They want to know how much to charge for insurance and your wellness data allows that. It's a good step to further control you

 

[EClyde]

Maybe they have a "Truman Show" project in mind.....

PS: Good movie actually (An insurance salesman discovers his whole life is actually a reality TV show.)

It's a stupid movie.

 

[StupidPeopleSuk]

Seems a bit sexist to me......

Therefore, why don't they start giving MEN a gift card credit for every time they get a boner..... since that can also, in some ways, be related to "reproductive health & wellness"

Maybe that info will allow them to lower my insurance cost for mental illness treatments, yes ?

And, in case you dont understand, this is just my sarcasm and was not intended to offend or please anyone anywhere at any given time....

 

[Kibaruk]

Paying your employees for your health data isn't unusual... my company does it. The data allows the company to help provide tools for people to stay healthy and prevent problems. Paying employees to collect the data makes it voluntary, but you still get good participation.

Preventing an issue is WAY cheaper than curing one. Plus, with a healthier workforce you save on health insurance, and everyone prefers lower insurance rates. The company saves money, the employees save money, people miss less work, and everyone's better off.

Healthy moms and new babies are right at the top of the list when it comes to people to focus on. It's a very important and predictable health care need. And who doesn't want healthy moms and babies!?

Sorry, but I see NO conceivable reason they would need detailed reproductive data as part of an overall health and wellness program except for one possibility: fine-tuning their policies regarding maternity leave. In my experience all that ever amounts to is women receiving less time off to recover from pregnancy and bond with their newborn. And I just realized I used the word "conceivable". SIGH..

Well, paternity leave is something that gives some time off to parents (duh!) and companies need to plan this properly or production can be impacted, I'll also give them the benefit of the doubt, if they have more info they can plan accordingly and make it less stressful for everyone involved.

 

[Drew Valadez]

Well, paternity leave is something that gives some time off to parents (duh!)

Paternity is for fathers specifically.

Paying your employees for your health data isn't unusual... my company does it. The data allows the company to help provide tools for people to stay healthy and prevent problems. Paying employees to collect the data makes it voluntary, but you still get good participation.

Preventing an issue is WAY cheaper than curing one. Plus, with a healthier workforce you save on health insurance, and everyone prefers lower insurance rates. The company saves money, the employees save money, people miss less work, and everyone's better off.

Healthy moms and new babies are right at the top of the list when it comes to people to focus on. It's a very important and predictable health care need. And who doesn't want healthy moms and babies!?

I agree completely. I worked for a hospital that allowed us to save $40/pay period on our health insurance if you went to your doctor and provided the physical they wanted and a blood panel. The cost was free to go and have the checkup done and even got a normal doc visit out of the way.

They also had a $500 Reward Card if you completed a bunch of health activities online whether it was learning or documenting your workouts. You had to get 1000 points, or something like that, that you earned by watching simple 20-60 min lesson or speech about smoking, bad eating habbits, importance of sleep habbits, etc., that the employee could knock out over time. If you worked on it everyday for 15-30 mins, it was reachable in 4-6ish months on breaks at your desk.

The whole goal is to get people to do healthier things which makes health cost lower, nothing wrong with that, give em basic info in which they turn around and give you a personalized planner to improving health things according to you. Funny enough also part of it was they would give you a Fitbit that was somehow tied to your health account and would give you points that way, the business also had competitions of Teams of who could walk the farthest and durring the lunch hour, people were walking in groups everywhere and the break rooms would be emptier than normal because people started moving more often during their lunch hours.

Tin foil hat it if you will, I personally saw it jump start many co-workers into getting into shape when they introduced the health incentive program some 8-10 years ago.