People Are Clamoring to Buy Old Insulin Pumps
One day last June, Doug Boss pulled into a police-station parking lot to meet a stranger from Craigslist. His purpose: to buy used insulin pumps. Boss has type 1 diabetes, and he relies on a small pump attached to his body to deliver continuous doses of insulin that keep him alive.
To be clear, he didn’t need to buy used medical equipment on Craigslist. Boss, who is 55 and works in IT in Texas, has health insurance. He even has a new, in-warranty pump sitting at home. But he was thrilled to find on Craigslist a coveted old model that was made by the medical-device company Medtronic and discontinued years ago. What makes these outdated Medtronic pumps so desirable is, ironically, a security flaw. Boss was looking for a pump or two he could hack.
He’s not the only one. In 2014, realized that the security flaw in certain Medtronic pumps could be exploited for a DIY revolution. Type 1 diabetes is a disease where the pancreas is unable to produce insulin to control blood sugar. For years, Boss had counted, down to the gram, the carbohydrates in every meal and told his pump how much insulin to dispense. Every cup of coffee (more insulin), every brisk walk (less insulin) turned into a math problem with serious consequences: Extremely high or low blood sugar can be fatal. The healthy pancreas does these
