The team behind menstrual health and period tracking app Clue has said it will not disclose users’ data to American authorities, following Donald Trump’s reelection.

The message comes in response to concerns that during Trump’s second presidency, abortion bans that followed the overturn of Roe v. Wade in 2022 will worsen and states will attempt to increase menstrual surveillance in order to further restrict access to terminations.

  • zephorah@lemm.ee
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    2 days ago

    Newsweek has really trash headlines. No one’s asking, yet, so that’s a terrible headline.

    (Yes I voted Kamala, and yes I did it for medical autonomy reasons as well as orange potato reasons, Vance reasons, heritage foundation reasons, and Project 2025.)

    It’s still a trash headline and pretty standard fare for Newsweek. Why is it trash? Because it’s classic The Boy Who Cried Wolf. When I read this headline, I need it to be real.

  • cum@lemmy.cafe
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    2 days ago

    Cool but the proper solution is that they shouldn’t have access to this data at all. It should be either stored locally, or encrypted on their servers. Companies not being able to access their consumer data should be the default.

  • PagingDoctorLove@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    Still not worth the risk to download it. Get a paper journal, they make ones that guide you through tracking all the necessary data.

  • Treczoks@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    First I thought “WTF is period data a thing that should concern the government”, but then I noticed we are talking about the future Handmaids Tale country here.

  • daniskarma@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    2 days ago

    Why the hell period data needs to be stored on the cloud?

    How much could it weight? A few Kb? Local storage!

    I would never trust such data leaving my device when is no need for it whatsoever.

    Aren’t there any open source period tracking apps? I’ll do one, it can’t be that hard. An sqlite database patched to a frontend calendar and some basic predictions based on normal scenarios.

    • spujb@lemmy.cafe
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      2 days ago

      not defending the bogus use of the cloud to host sensitive data, nor do i unquestioningly believe this? but correcting the record since you did 80% of the work in finding the link:

      Be assured that the sensitive health data you track in the Clue app is never shared with or sold to advertisers, or any partners whose services we may recommend in Clue.

      If you actually read what you sent it seems like the only data that is shared to advertisers is standard marketing stuff like IP, device ID, age group, and location. Still bad and I stand with others recommending locally hosted FOSS alternatives.

  • SplashJackson@lemmy.ca
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    2 days ago

    Why do they need to save the tracked period data to a server farm? Why can’t it just be saved on the phone, huh?

    • el_abuelo@programming.dev
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      2 days ago

      Probably because they want to be able to maintain users during device switches. Given much of the world is on an annual or bi-annual cycle it’d suck to lose your users each time.

      • frayedpickles@lemmy.cafe
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        2 days ago

        They could just do the password manager approach where the data is encrypted on your phone but stored in the cloud. App retains users, sensitive data remains private.

        • communism@lemmy.ml
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          2 days ago

          I wonder how many average users would be bothered to export their period database and transfer to a new phone every time they get a new phone. I do that when I get a new phone (not often, I use my phones till they break/are literally unusable and unfixable), but I’ve had real trouble getting other people to do these kinds of things.

  • kureta@lemmy.ml
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    2 days ago

    menstrual surveillance

    Now that’s a phrase I would’ve never thought I would read.

    • captainlezbian@lemmy.world
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      2 days ago

      Why? It’s a logical outcome of the combination of mass surveillance and draconian anti abortion laws. This is the sort of shit the judicial construction of the implied right to privacy was kinda built around stopping. This is just straight up the sort of shit Snowden warned us of.

      So yeah, the federal government (and likely state as well), who have the data from your personal devices to understand far more of your sex life than you want your friends knowing, much less your Senator, are able to purchase or subpoena data from menstrual tracking apps and will do as the law tells them to. The law, meanwhile is written by a group of people who are vastly disproportionately elderly men with little to know understanding of any branch of science or medicine. A group notable for comments like the assumption that ecoptic pregnancies can be replanted and that presenting a snowball disproves global warming. The one gynecologist of note to have been in Congress in recent memory being Ron fucking Paul, who incidentally was anti choice.

      To sum my previous paragraph to a thesis statement: people who have no idea how bodies work and couldn’t tell a Skene’s gland from a vas deferens and disproportionately think pee comes out the vagina get to decide the rules by which people who know every aspect of your life that they choose to look for decide if your menstrual irregularities are normal or an illegal abortion.

  • Brumefey@sh.itjust.works
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    2 days ago

    Can’t those app offer this feature : replace all the original data by pseudo random data shifting the menstruation cycle in a way that would benefit the user at that moment ? Or : shift all data to x days (easier to undo)

    It’s crazy that we live in a world where we have to think about such things…