From tracking sleep quality and heart rate to monitoring activity levels and location, wearable devices quietly collect an enormous amount of personal data every single day. With nearly one in three Americans now using a wearable, the scale of data generation is unprecedented. Most users can easily view this information inside an app — but what happens after it leaves the device is far less visible.
The uncomfortable truth is that most wearable data doesn’t belong to the user once it’s synced. It’s stored on centralized cloud servers operated by third parties like AWS, Google Cloud, or Microsoft Azure. This means users are placing blind trust not only in the wearable manufacturer, but also in the infrastructure providers behind the scenes. And unlike medical records, wearable data isn’t protected by regulations like HIPAA — making it even more exposed.
That lack of protection has already had consequences. In 2021, more than 61 million records from Fitbit and Apple users were exposed due to unsecured third-party databases. These weren’t medical files — they were fitness and lifestyle records — yet they revealed deeply personal information. As wearables become more advanced, the risks only grow.
Concerns escalated further with cases like Oura Ring, which has sold over 5.5 million devices. In 2025, a manufacturing deal tied to the U.S. Department of Defense revealed that sensitive data could be hosted by Palantir, a company widely associated with surveillance technology. This highlighted a bigger issue: centralized storage means centralized control.
This is where decentralized storage solutions like @walrusprotocol offer a different path forward. Walrus enables data to be stored as onchain-compatible assets, giving users verifiable ownership and transparent access controls. Instead of trusting unknown intermediaries, data security is enforced through decentralized infrastructure and cryptography.
With $WAL, personal data can shift from being passively harvested to actively owned. As wearables continue to evolve, the future of privacy won’t be decided by devices alone — it will be defined by who controls the storage layer.
