Philip Morris, the big tobacco company behind the IQOS, a new smokeless tobacco product that heats tobacco sticks instead of burning them like a conventional cigarette, may be in an advantageous position when it comes to collecting personal user data on IQOS users, which could allow them to profile user vaping habits. But are they actually collecting this data and if so- are they using it?
At this time, the company is building a database of their IQOS customers, but only those who register themselves with the company. But, that’s not to say that the IQOS itself won’t one day harvest user data, adding to what the company knows about their IQOS users and their usage habits.
A software application that the company has developed, if regulators allow it, could harvest usage data directly from IQOS devices, which could in turn be used by the company for marketing purposes, according to a former project manager at the company who tested the aforementioned software application in Japan, Reuters reported.
The former project manager, Shiro Masaoka, worked at Philip Morris from 2012 to 2016.
Philip Morris responded to an inquiry about Masaoka’s comments, stating that the software in the IQOS that controls the temperature of its heating element and the duration of its use “is not used for marketing purposes whatsoever.”
Regardless of the potential to extract user usage information and to build profiles on users for marketing purposes, Philip Morris has clearly stated that the only time that they extract data from devices is when they’re trying to determine what went wrong with a malfunctioning device.
In other words, the tobacco giant is not building profiles on users based on data harvested from IQOS devices — at least not at the moment.
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