More than 100 women who have used period- or pregnancy-tracking apps revealed a host of subtle strategies they use to protect their data and retain control.
The Ovia pregnancy-tracking app. By Drew Harwell Drew Harwell National technology reporter covering artificial intelligence Email Bio Follow April 25 at 8:00 AM When Heather Irvine used the Ovia apps to track her trying-to-conceive months and first pregnancy, she logged pretty much everything going on with her body, from the look of her cervical fluid to the days she was having sex. But after she gave birth, the app wouldn’t let her record it without entering her newborn’s name and birthday.
To deal with that dilemma, many women said they had devised strategies to compel the apps to give them what they want while also keeping all of their most sensitive data to themselves. They used fake names, logged only scattered details and even fudged data to keep the tech companies and other potential snoops off their trail.Their stories highlighted one of the more nuanced ways people think about privacy in the modern Internet age.
Ovia declined to comment. But representatives at competing apps said the women who used them most often shared accurate information about themselves because they wanted the best results.
Some said they had shared the tracked menstrual data with their doctors and spouses, and that they gave the apps a remarkable level of trust. One woman who wanted not to get pregnant said she had stopped taking birth-control pills because she believed so completely in the advice of her ovulation-tracking app.Other respondents, however, said they didn’t feel the apps were worth the mental strain.
Respondents were especially resistant to the apps’ requests for early health data on their children, which several of the apps have advertised will help parents chart and assess their newborns’ growth. Some said they felt the data collection was a way of infringing on their children’s privacy before they could understand or consent. “I want them to have autonomy with their digital footprint as much as possible,” one woman wrote.
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