Flo period tracker launches ‘Anonymous Mode’ to fight abortion privacy concerns

Interval monitoring app Flo launched an “Nameless Mode” on Wednesday, which lets individuals use the app with out linking their information to their identify, electronic mail deal with, or IP deal with.

The brand new function — which the corporate says it hopes will set a brand new normal for privateness protections in well being apps — is a direct response to privateness considerations stemming from the overturn of Roe v. Wade in June. Following the ruling, reproductive justice advocates raised the alarm over the attainable use of the delicate information collected by interval monitoring apps in prosecuting abortion seekers.

“The world isn’t designed for privateness,” mentioned Roman Bugaev, chief expertise officer at Flo, in an interview with The Verge. “We have to rethink the entire web with this in thoughts.” 

Within the aftermath of the US Supreme Courtroom choice to finish federal safety for abortion, interval monitoring apps like Flo got here beneath explicit scrutiny as customers apprehensive that the information path from these apps might be used towards individuals suspected of getting an abortion. Specialists say this sort of information request isn’t the primary means regulation enforcement is more likely to pursue circumstances, however the outcome was nonetheless a brand new sensitivity towards information assortment for any product associated to reproductive well being. When the choice leaked in early Could, most cycle monitoring apps mentioned that they didn’t plan to make modifications to their insurance policies. 

Interval and cycle monitoring apps have a tendency to not have nice privateness protections, and Flo, which has round 40 million month-to-month customers, has stumbled publicly in its dealing with of consumer information. Final 12 months, it settled with the Federal Commerce Fee over allegations that it shared well being info with outdoors corporations after promising customers it might hold information personal. 

The crew realized loads concerning the significance of privateness and consumer belief via that course of, Bugaev says. “That’s why we determined to double down on this.”

After the leak of the draft opinion revealing that the Supreme Courtroom was planning to overturn Roe v. Wade, Flo began having conversations with customers who mentioned they had been apprehensive about utilizing cycle trackers that linked their id to their information. “They had been apprehensive concerning the implications of continuous to make use of interval monitoring apps like Flo,” Cath Everett, vice chairman of product at Flo, informed The Verge. “So we knew that we had a consumer drawback and an actual challenge that they needed us to unravel.”

The precise choice was launched in late June. Since then, 12 states have banned most abortions, and bans are working their means via the courts in others. Conversely, some states like Rhode Island and Connecticut have put new protections round abortion rights in place. 

Flo fast-tracked growth of the nameless function when Roe v. Wade was formally overturned. However fixing the problem was not so simple as simply deleting customers’ contact info and different account particulars. The energy of an app like Flo is within the insights it can provide to a consumer by discovering patterns in many various information factors, and sending that information over the web from a cellphone to Flo’s cloud servers would usually depart many figuring out items of metadata, like IP deal with logs, that may tie info again to particular customers.

To take away this doubtlessly figuring out info, Flo labored with net infrastructure firm Cloudflare to implement an rising net normal often known as “Oblivious HTTP.” As described in Flo’s whitepaper, Oblivious HTTP separates information content material from IP deal with info by utilizing a relay service to switch encrypted information between an app consumer and Flo’s servers. Basically, the relay will know the place the information request is coming from however not what it accommodates, and Flo can see what the information accommodates however gained’t know the place it comes from.

“The fantastic thing about Nameless Mode is that it makes it attainable for customers to nonetheless have the personalised expertise and the perception based mostly on the information that they’re offering however, on the finish of the day, that that information can’t be tracked again to them,” Everett says. 

Due to the character of the Nameless Mode, the crew gained’t have the ability to see precisely how many individuals activate the function, Bugaev says. However they’ll have the ability to get a common high-level estimate, and so they’re anticipating it to be within the tens of millions. 

The Nameless Mode will not be for everybody, Everett says — Flo customers who selected it’ll lose some options. Internet customers can’t use Nameless Mode with the paid model of Flo, which incorporates video programs and chats with the Flo Well being Assistant. Customers can’t join with a wearable gadget. In addition they can’t switch info to a brand new cellphone if theirs is damaged or stolen. The crew needed to incorporate as a lot performance as attainable however needed to make some tradeoffs due to the challenges in constructing a really nameless product, Bugaev says. 

The crew at Flo says it hopes the mode conjures up different teams to construct comparable methods that additionally put anonymity on the forefront. “I feel we should always work collectively on a few of these points,” Bugaev says. “It’s very laborious to maneuver the entire business alongside.” 

Correction September 14th, 10:21AM ET: A earlier model of this story said that Nameless Mode can’t be used with the paid model of Flo. It can’t be used with the paid model of the online app, however is obtainable on the paid model of the iOS app. We remorse the error.