Second-order interoperability in the datafication of public health

With internet use becoming an integral part of many people’s everyday lives, using the internet to obtain health information and engage in self-care is by now an established practice (Nettleton, Burrows & O’Malley 2005). Searching for health information online produces a data trace that consists of search terms and information on their distribution over time, which can be stored in the user’s web browser as well as in the search engine’s databases. Health-information seeking online and other online activities produce data traces of our actions, in a process that can be referred to as datafication (van Dijck 2014). This continually produces updating data sets, which can then be repurposed in different contexts (Newell & Marabelli 2015). Within the realm of public health, datafication is being adopted in syndromic surveillance – the practice of monitoring population health in order to formulate appropriate public health responses. Infodemiology exemplifies how web search traces, which often consist of search terms related to symptoms, are being used to identify a potential outbreak that could require a public health intervention (Eysenbach 2006).