For years, the health data company IQVIA has quietly purchased detailed financial and demographic information on tens of millions of Americans from the credit reporting company Experian — one of many streams of data, including hospital records, that help IQVIA deliver marketing insights to drug companies and device makers.
IQVIA does not publicly discuss its work with Experian. But a STAT investigation uncovered internal documents showing IQVIA employees had raised concerns about the adequacy of privacy safeguards surrounding the data, which included records on more than 120 million people.
In a four-hour conversation, IQVIA executives, including deputy general counsel Harvey Ashman, discussed the company’s data handling and de-identification practices, and the implications of trading on such massive amounts of personal data without the knowledge or permission of consumers.
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