A growing trend in the fitness industry is the use of wearable electronic devices to track personal health and training information, such as sleeping patterns, heart rate, running speed, calories burned, current location, and distance and route traveled. These wearable devices are aimed at consumers who want to live healthier lifestyles by letting them track their daily activities to help monitor their fitness progress. Although perhaps helpful for such purposes, using these devices may come at the expense of one’s privacy.

Users of wearable fitness devices should be aware that manufacturers of the devices may sell users’ personal health and fitness information to third parties without the user’s consent. Because of the potential for sharing personal information, users should read the privacy policy associated with the device to gain a better understanding of the data that will be collected (and, subsequently, the manufacturer of the device) and to what extent the manufacturer may resell, reuse, or repurpose this data. To further protect themselves, users may consider opting out of the device’s data-sharing functions entirely. An August 2014 article in CIO magazine provides several tips on how to read and understand privacy policies for wearable devices.