Cambridge researchers urge public health bodies like the NHS to provide trustworthy, research-driven alternatives to platforms driven by profit.
Women deserve better than to have their menstrual tracking data treated as consumer data - Prof Gina Neff
Smartphone apps that track menstrual cycles are a “gold mine” for consumer profiling, collecting information on everything from exercise, diet and medication to sexual preferences, hormone levels and contraception use.
This is according to a new report from the University of Cambridge’s Minderoo Centre for Technology and Democracy, which argues that the financial worth of this data is “vastly underestimated” by users who supply profit-driven companies with highly intimate details in a market lacking in regulation.
The report’s authors caution that cycle tracking app (CTA) data in the wrong hands could result in risks to job prospects, workplace monitoring, health insurance discrimination and cyberstalking – and limit access to abortion.
They call for better governance of the booming ‘femtech’ industry to protect users when their data is sold at scale, arguing that apps must provide clear consent options rather than all-or-nothing data collection, and urge public health bodies to launch alternatives to commercial CTAs.
flo app makes $192 million a year with 5 million paying users, which seems absolutely wild to me for something that covers such a basic need
Made my own desktop app in python (tkinter) which encrypts the data with GPG. It has predictions and potential ovulation days. The predictions seem pretty accurate so far.
Has “if it makes a funny noise I’ll shoot the computer” vibes, love it
Haha thanks. If you want to check it out, the link is: https://codeberg.org/kingorgg/period_tracker
I haven’t tried it on windows though, so I’m not sure if it will work properly on there. It’s just a personal project for now. The UI is pretty basic too.
As a trans woman, I make sure to log my irregular bi-weekly periods on flo to make sure their data is tip top!
Use free and open source software to protect your data. This goes for everybody on any device.
Yes of course but it’s marketing data.
Marketing data. We need it for marketing to people so they can spend money.
Don’t you understand! Marketing data!!!
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Many city’s don’t allow neon at all. ☹️
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My wife used to use the tracker in fitbit (I think), but once US states started passing laws to track periods, she’s stopped using it. It’s the wild west in my house now.
There are 2 open source menstrual trackers in f-droid. They don’t share data.
You can also use an analog tracker…
My wife just asks me to grab her boobs and I can generally let her know several days out and be accurate to within half a day.
You need to teach me this skill. Any excuse to get frisky with my wife.
How adorable
The humans in my family who experience menstrual cycles have been pretty happy with Clue who have an explicit promise to never give up your data. YMMV and of course you should evaluate what a promise from this organization means to you.
The humans in my family who experience menstrual cycles
lol
Something funny about humans doing human things?
When they get your data, nothing will bring that copy back. ToS never works, libre software does.
Drip (Android/iOS)
Yep. Info never leaves your phone.
If you have an iPhone just use the Apple Health app. It works great and the data is encrypted and never shared with anyone.
Wrong, Apple Health fails to include a libre software license text file. We do not control it, anti-libre software. Some still believe anything Apple tell them. Others here have already given a replacement for this scam.
What fact did I get wrong? Be specific.
never shared with anyone.
Anti-libre software, Apple Health, bans us from proving this and worse, bans us from fixing it. We do not control it. 🚩
And which phone has a libre radio baseband? Perhaps extremism ad absurdum is not useful advice.
which phone has a libre radio baseband
You’re doing nothing to fix this. This is how those scam apps keep scamming.
Sis thinks getting drip, libre software, is ‘extremism’ lmao
Here’s another: https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/comment/19346855
Everyone else has figured it out but some do not want a solution, just parrot Apple.
I didn’t realize those were baseband firmwares. Neat!
Some people never learn.
Not wrong. You’re arguing a different point than what they said.
Already trapped in iOS? More anti-libre apps make escape harder.
I don’t disagree with that, but the point here was freedom from advertisers and general data privacy, not data portability.
But there is an “export all data” feature in health, though.
Lol sure apple doesnt use that data internally. /s
Yes, probably someone would like to, but they can’t.
I don’t know anything about health app in particular, but they posted some cool methods for finding highlight photos in your library using what they call “differential privacy” on their research blog.
https://machinelearning.apple.com/research/scenes-differential-privacy
Read my first comment again.
Read the original comment again.
File this under “no shit.”
that was my initial thought too, but then I remembered that if may not be so obvious to those who aren’t like-minded like that. it’s still good to share with friends and family who might not know about it
I legitimately have an idea for an app that solves this problem. Its key feature, besides being open source, would be that people without uteruses could use it too, making any data conceivably collected useless.
I don’t have the skills to make it myself (yet), but if any developer wants to talk I’ll give the idea away. I just want it to be made.
App would be open source, all data local. Perhaps the option to sync to encrypted iCloud or Android equivalent, but certainly not a cloud-based option you need a new login for. All the features currently in these kinds of apps and that make them useful for menstruating people. Now replace “period” with “hair cut”. Non-menstruating people can now use it, earnestly, for tracking when their last hair cut was, making it useful and the data (if it were to be collected somehow) just noise.
I even have a name in mind: “hair**.**cuts” (heavy emphasis on the period in the name.) Idea is that anyone with it on their device has plausible deniability that they are using it for period tracking, but the “period” in the name is an implicit wink so we all know what it’s really being used for.
You could even expand this idea by being able to add different things to track and give it a name yourself!
No woman in the US should be tracking their period in any sort of app or software.
Apple Health encrypts your data and never sends it to anyone else.
Convenience wins out 99% of the time. Why carry a pen/paper when one can use the same device they already carry around? Hell, I don’t even use pen/paper anymore because my phone handles all that for me.
That said, I did set up some infrastructure at home that I use to store as much of my private data as possible.
it can be tracked safely with an app that only stores local data.
I’m not sure what you’re scared of.
Drip, the app mentioned several times in this thread, let’s you encrypt the locally stored database with a password you have to enter every time you open the app. How is that not safer than a random piece of paper?
It’s so exhausting that this thread is full of men telling women what they should and shouldn’t do while having very little knowledge about the topic.
And of people who assume the genders of others.
I’m sorry if I misgendered you. I was already exhausted from the other comments that clearly state that they are men and probably was biased in that regard. But my point still stands that there is no reason to completely forego tracking apps.
Yeah, and of course I haven’t looked into all of the tech and security of ways to set up these apps. I’m just exhausted myself from it seeming like nothing is ever 100% secure or free from risk, and I’m so cynical about the country I live in and what it will become in the future that I would just rather not trust anything at this point. I’m sure that doesn’t 100% hold water/is completely rational, but it’s where my head is.
I get that. It shouldn’t be necessary to do research just to be sure it’s safe. I apologise for my aggressive tone. It must be really scary and exhausting to live somewhere like that. My country is still holding up but seems to be sliding slowly in that direction too.
So do whatever makes you stay safe and feel safe.
I appreciate it and you
Why not?
I mean there are at least 2 apps for that in F-Droid. It’s just that most people are FOSS illiterate and only if a big corpo give them shit then they trust it.
I tried to talk to my wife about data ownership, opensource, etc. but it’s difficult to convey how important it is. She uses Flow. I’m trying to get her to at least try alternatives such as Drip
Not surprising, ‘open source’ is a deliberately ambiguous term, engineered to derailed libre software. First, clear up your own understanding, before telling others. Use simple words like control, scam and abuse. See this example. https://lemmy.world/post/21620691
Not everyone uses Android devices.
Well on iOS there’s the Apple health app. To my knowledge it stores health data locally. I’ll double check now.
Edit: it does store health data in iCloud by default, but according to Apple its end to end encrypted
By default, iCloud automatically keeps your Health app data, including health records, up to date across your devices. To disable this feature, open iCloud settings and turn off Health. iCloud protects your health records data by encrypting it both in storage and during transmission. If you’re using iOS 12 or later and have turned on two-factor authentication for your Apple Account, health records are encrypted using end-to-end encryption through iCloud. This means only you can access this information, and only on devices where you’re signed in to iCloud. No one else, not even Apple, can access end-to-end encrypted information.
I’m aware, but the person I responded to specifically mentioned F-Droid, which is Android-only.
Wrong, Apple Health fails to include a libre software license text file. We do not control it, anti-libre software. Does Apple really think we are this easy to scam? It bans us from fixing backdoors. 🚩
I mean, sure - but if you really don’t trust Apple to keep their word, then it wouldn’t matter if their Health app was FOSS or not. iOS itself is still (and probably forever will be) a closed source operating system. That gives them the power to do anything, including hijack the data from FOSS apps.
Yeah I know it’s not FOSS in the slightest, but it’s not a predatory app selling your health data to the highest bidder, presumably. I acknowledge that requires taking Apple’s word at face value though
Do women need an app for this? Surely a piece of paper would work just as well, and have a 0% chance of selling your data.
The same could be said of to-do lists, right? But I still like having an app with a checklist, because my phone is always with me and a piece of paper is not.
When I did have periods (thank god for testosterone), I had a really difficult time keeping track of them and they were often very irregular. The app I used helped me pick up patterns and would warn me when I needed to be prepped. My dysphoria cope was pretending that they didn’t happen ever, so it was helpful to have that occasional “hey, pack some pads today” as a notification without constantly checking a calendar.
Do you really need a computer and social media? Just read the newspaper.
absolutely. you can also go back to sending hand written mail instead of using email or messaging apps too, but this is 2025 and software exists to help keep track of this.
also apps exist that store local data only.
Do people need an app for taking notes? Or a calendar?
Sure, I used to do it on paper for many years. But it’s much more convenient to track it on my phone, which I have almost always with me. That way I can check whether I’m likely to be bleeding heavily before making plans with my friends to go swimming that day or on a long hike without access to a toilet.
Also many women don’t just track the blood flow but also other data like temperature, cervix and cervical mucus. This helps calculate the most fertile days. It’s much easier to let an app do that.
Exacty, Drip features tracking for temperature, cervical mucus, the cervix, sex (solo or partner), desire, pain, and mood, along with spotting and your bleeding levels. It’s not just about “when will I have my period?” Additionally I love Drip because of the heads-up notif I get from them 3 days before my predicted period date. Also ut’s nice to have a computer calculate when my period will be and shows me if any were a little off or earlier than expected.
Plus since it’s encrypted and local, law enforcement would have to crack that to find my period data. I could totally imagine law enforcement coming up with a bullshit warrant and breaking into someone’s home, and finding a calendar or notebook marked with their period data and being tried for it.
Do they include period prediction now?
Yup! Pretty accurate too. Shows the day that it’s most likely to happen, and the two days around it are potential days. Gives you a notif about 5 days before it’s predicted to happen.
