ObamaCare Website and Personal Data

The ObamaCare website HealthCare.Gov does not share personally identifiable information with third parities, learn more about ObamaCare’s privacy policy for data.

HealthCare.Gov’s privacy policy explains how they share data that can’t identify you, and how they protect data that can.

Facts on How Personal Data is Shared and Stored on HealthCare.Gov

• Your information is stored under and safeguarded in accordance with the Privacy Act of 1974, as amended (5 U.S.C. Section 552a).
• There have been no major reported security issues with the site.
• All HealthCare.Gov uses of Web-based technologies that comply with existing privacy and data safeguarding policies and standards
• HealthCare.gov doesn’t collect any personally identifiable information (PII) unless you provide them with it (ie fill out a form or create an application). There is always an extra privacy policy when personal information is being collected.
• You don’t have to give HealthCare.Gov personal information.
• Almost every website including HealthCare.Gov collects at least basic non-personally identifiable information from it’s users using web metrics tools such as Google Analytics. That information is:
  • Domain from which you access the Internet
  • IP address (an IP or internet protocol address is a number that is automatically given to a computer connected to the Web)
  • Operating system on your computer and information about the browser you used when visiting the site
  • Date and time of your visit
  • Pages you visited
  • Address of the website that connected you to HealthCare.gov (such as google.com or bing.com)
• Like other websites HealthCare.Gov also shares “cookie” data with third parities, but doesn’t share personally identifiable information with third parities. You can disable cookies or opt-out of cookies.
• HealthCare.Gov shares data to accomplish it’s mission and goals, not for commercial marketing.
• According to the Associated Press non-personally identifiable can also include: age, income, ZIP code, whether a person smokes, and if a person is pregnant. Things you may have entered into a form that were associated with your IP address.
• Third parities include things like Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, Bing, Google. Third parities can use “remarketing” of that non-identifying information to show you relevant advertising .
• The plus side of sharing this data is remarketing is the only way to prevent seeing that totally irrelevant commercials when you browse the web and watch Youtube.
• The con of sharing of non-identifying information is that enough pieces of non-identifying data can be put together to potentially identify a person.
• Personally identifiable information is shared with your Health Insurer, the IRS for purposes of filing your 1095-A form, and in other ways you would expect.
• If you click on a link that sends you outside of HealthCare.Gov you shouldn’t expect the privacy policy to apply any more.
• Beyond the website, the Affordable Care Act actually builds upon HIPPA including new rules for health plan transactions and fund transfers.

Learn more about the HealthCare.Gov and security. To be clear, we are a free informational website discussing the privacy policy of the official Health Insurance Marketplace, we are not owned or operated by the US federal or state government.