It is interesting how events on the other side of the world can suddenly bring unrecognized risks into clear focus.
This appeared last week:
Post Roe, women in America are right to be concerned about digital surveillance – and it’s not just period-tracking apps
· Melissa Sweet
· Uri Gal
· Wednesday, June 29, 2022
Digital surveillance is a threat to public health in many ways, and the United States ruling against abortion rights is a powerful reminder of an urgent need for legislative reform to better protect the community, according to Uri Gal, Professor in Business Information Systems at the University of Sydney.
This article was first published at The Conversation.
Uri Gal writes:
The reversal of Roe v. Wade by the American Supreme court last week is a watershed moment in American politics. The ruling withdraws constitutional protections for abortion rights and sends the issue to the states, around half of which are expected to ban abortions.
Unlike the last time abortion was illegal in the United States, almost half a century ago, we now live in an era of pervasive digital surveillance enabled by the internet and mobile phones. Digital data may well be used to identify, track, and incriminate women who seek abortion.
Over the past 20 years or so, large tech companies, mobile app operators, data brokers, and online ad companies have built a comprehensive system to collect, analyse, and share huge amounts of data. Companies can follow our every movement, profile our behaviour, and snoop on our emotions.
Until now, this system has mostly been used to sell us things. But following last week’s ruling, many are concerned that personal data could be used to surveil pregnancies, shared with law enforcement agencies, or sold to vigilantes.
Data everywhere
There are various sources of data that could be used to identify, track, and prosecute women who are suspected of seeking an abortion.
Google routinely shares private user information with law enforcement agencies, even without a warrant. This includes search terms, which could be used as evidence by law enforcement agencies investigating or prosecuting abortion-related cases.
Online surveillance can also include location data. American police already use location data from mobile devices to collect evidence against suspected criminals.
What’s more, many mobile apps track your location and share it with data brokers. The brokers then sell the data on to a myriad of unknown third parties, including law enforcement agencies. This happens even when people have opted out of location data collection.
The same technology could be used to track women’s movements, and report when they went near an abortion facility or travelled to a different state where abortions are legal.
Social media
Social media activity, and data collected by social media platforms, can also be used to infer whether someone may be pregnant or is interested in getting an abortion.
A recent investigation showed hundreds of “crisis pregnancy centres” – quasi-healthcare clinics that aim to dissuade women from having abortions – around the US shared website visitor information with Facebook. In some cases, this revealed people’s names and addresses, as well as whether a woman was considering an abortion.
The investigation also showed anti-abortion organisations were able to get access to some of this information. If abortion is made a crime, this information could be used against women in legal proceedings.
Period trackers
Data from fertility and health apps could also be used to identify and track women who are suspected of seeking abortion. These apps record highly private information including menstruation cycles, sexual activity, and hormonal treatments.
However, many of these apps share unencrypted sensitive information with data brokers and ad companies without users’ knowledge or consent.
With the end of institutional protections for abortions, many worry that data from such applications could be used as evidence against women in legal proceedings.
More on the implications here:
There is a discussion of why it matters here:
Privacy experts recommend deleting period tracking apps as Roe v Wade abortion decision overturned
A chilling warning has gone out across the United States about exactly what authorities could do with personal data stored on womens’ phones.
June 26, 2022 - 2:35PM
Women in the US are concerned about how far authorities will go to stop abortions after a historic decision ended their legal right to terminate a pregnancy in their first two trimesters.
Advocates are concerned that a woman’s search history, location data and period tracking apps could be used by authorities to find out if she is pregnant, if she is considering abortion and if she goes through with the abortion.
On Saturday morning AEST, millions of American women lost the legal right to have an abortion after the US Supreme Court overturned a landmark ruling which for nearly half a century had protected women.
Roe v Wade, which in 1973 provided the constitutional right to abortions up until foetal viability, was overturned on Friday local time.
It is now up to each state to determine whether women can have legal abortions.
However, 26 states are either"certain or likely" to ban abortions, according to a research group.
If abortion is criminalised, period-tracking apps could have no choice but to share their customers’ most personal data. .
In a now-viral Twitter post, US author Jessica Khoury warned her followers. “Delete your period tracking apps today,” she wrote.
Lots more here:
In a better bit of news we had this:
Google to delete user location history on US abortion clinic visits
Google has faced calls to limit smartphone data collection in the wake of anti-abortion laws passed in the United States
July 2, 2022 - 11:14AM AFP
Google announced Friday it would delete users' location history when they visit abortion clinics, domestic violence shelters and other places where privacy is sought.
"If our systems identify that someone has visited one of these places, we will delete these entries from Location History soon after they visit," Jen Fitzpatrick, a senior vice president at Google, wrote in a blog post. "This change will take effect in the coming weeks."
The announcement comes a week after the US Supreme Court made the tectonic decision to strip American women of constitutional rights to abortion, leading a dozen states to ban or severely restrict the procedure and prompting mass protests across the country.
Fitzpatrick also sought to reassure users that the company takes data privacy seriously.
"We take into account the privacy and security expectations of people using our products, and we notify people when we comply with government demands."
More here:
It seems to me that what this all adds up to is the surveillance state that US women now live in that law enforcement can track to down and charge you for seeking what is really just healthcare- controversial this may be for some. Worse hiding from this surveillance is very, very difficult!
And remember pretty much the same arrangements for surveillance are in place in OZ.
We really either give up freely or have collected so much data that can be used against us in all sorts of ways maybe we need to re-think how we go about life.
Awareness of what we are giving away and simple moves like using more secure browsers and more encryption may help!
What do readers think are the best approaches to keeping as lower profile as possible or is it a lost cause?
David.
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