Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Period tracking app, Flo, found to be selling user data to Meta

femtechdesigndesk.substack.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

231–240 of 285 posts

Re: Period tracking app, Flo, found to be selling user data to Meta

#231

Post by brokenmachine »

lrvick wrote: post #227
sigmoid10 wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately, companies like Apple (and soon Google as well) are making this unnecessarily hard in their phone ecosystems.

It is actually a perfectly practical choice to completely ignore those ecosystems. I am the founder and active engineer at two companies and two large open source projects and have a family, travel a lot, and have an active social life in Silicon Valley. I also do not use any Apple, Google, Meta, or Microsoft products and exclusively use open source software for all of my work. It turns out none of this is incompatib…

Do you have only a dumb phone?

Re: Period tracking app, Flo, found to be selling user data to Meta

#232

Post by culi »

culi wrote: post #135

[drip.]( https://bloodyhealth.gitlab.io/ ) [source]( https://gitlab.com/bloodyhealth/drip ) - around since 2019. Last update 2 months ago - iOS, Android - React Native Mensinator [source]( https://github.com/EmmaTellblom/Mensinator ) - around since 2024. Last update 2 weeks ago - Android - Kotlin [Menstrudel]( https://menstrudel.app/ ) [source]( https://github.com/J-shw/Menstrudel ) - around since 2015. Last updated…

Oops I meant to write that Menstrude has been around since 2025 not 2015

Re: Period tracking app, Flo, found to be selling user data to Meta

#233

Post by jrflowers »

vorpalhex wrote: post #162
mghackerlady wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course, but treating transgender men like you would a cisgender woman with all the same gendered expectations is both incredibly disrespectful if done on purpose and humiliating for someone who very much does not want to be treated as a woman despite having a period that most likely already makes them very uncomfortable and dysphoric > only biological women have periods generally, yes, but there are so many edge c…

Language is consumed by people, not machines. You don't have to speak like a lawyer. There is no intersex person waiting to jump out and yell accusatory things at you because you didn't include sufficient asterisks or you said statements that are 99.9999% true.

> There is no intersex person waiting to jump out and yell accusatory things at you because you didn't include sufficient asterisks or you said statements that are 99.9999% true.

I would assume that the app isn’t pink because the devs aren’t worried about getting yelled at. The number of intersex people is minuscule compared to the amount of folks that have Opinions about them online.

Re: Period tracking app, Flo, found to be selling user data to Meta

#234

Post by culi »

sevenseacat wrote: post #113
frankdenbow wrote: post #22

its crazy to me that Flo is used so widely, as its started by Russian men and their treatment of data has bee public for a while, it just hasnt spread fast enough. I know theres at least one other option called Calessa ( http://Calessa.app )

There's a whole heap of different period tracking apps these days. I've been using Clue for probably a decade.

That one is good I think. It's German and adheres to EU privacy laws. The main FLOSS one is called drip. Has some funding from the German government as well as Mozilla

https://bloodyhealth.gitlab.io/

Re: Period tracking app, Flo, found to be selling user data to Meta

#235

Post by DANmode »

coldpie wrote: post #106
JohnFen wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or, you know, she could just track it without any app at all and share it with you in person.

Computers are useful tools that do useful things for people. It is reasonable for people to want to use them to do things they find useful. They don't have to function like spy devices, but we've chosen to highly reward the people who have turned them into spy devices, so they do. We could choose to do something else with them instead. For example we could pass & enforce privacy regulations so they cannot function as…

> we've chosen to highly reward

No, investors have.

This is an important point.

Society did not choose freemium, it did not choose high fructose corn syrup. It was content with the products straight, the way they were.

Re: Period tracking app, Flo, found to be selling user data to Meta

#236

Post by ksenzee »

embedding-shape wrote: post #191
filleduchaos wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sorry but this is bordering on parody to me. The way she would notice it "sooner or later" is by her bleeding on her clothes and possibly even furniture. In what world is it important for you to just know about it and somehow not important for her to avoid that?

> The way she would notice it "sooner or later" is by her bleeding on her clothes and possibly even furniture. No, many can feel it beforehand, and you notice it when you go to the bathroom before as well, as certain things change their properties slightly, it's not a "nothing" phase and then "floods out of your body". It's borderline parody how little education there is for males when it comes to things like this.

I appreciate that you've educated yourself about these issues, but let me assure you from decades of personal experience and conversations with other women that it is useful to be notified when your period is going to start.

Re: Period tracking app, Flo, found to be selling user data to Meta

#238

Post by duskdozer »

FireBeyond wrote: post #165
culi wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great video, thanks for sharing. TL;DW: HIPAA was actually created to allow insurance companies to share patient data without having to get patient consent. Before HIPAA, data was more fractured and less commonly shared. The only privacy protections it offers is, e.g., your doctor not giving your data to your boss. But about 1.5 million private entities can legally access your data (everything from health startups to…

> But about 1.5 million private entities can legally access your data Somewhat. They are allowed to access it "for treatment purposes", not just to nose around out of curiosity. I found myself explaining this to a number of my patients (I used to be a paramedic) who were irate about disclosures they'd made to their therapist, doctor, etc., that they had said they didn't want revealed to other providers (but were actu…

HIPAA is much less protective than people think, but "the law allows this thing you hate" isn't going to make people hate something less

Re: Period tracking app, Flo, found to be selling user data to Meta

#239

Post by duskdozer »

voakbasda wrote: post #116
nwatson wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Admissible evidence probably requires parallel construction and then a warrant. The purchased data is the catalyst but not legally actionable.

Parallel construction like that is unambiguously fruit from the poison tree. It should never be allowed, and the fact that it is used routinely is one of the many ongoing travesties in the US.

That's the "parallel" part. They're using information that they aren't allowed to use but are constructing an alternate path to get to the same conclusion with information they could be allowed to use, even though they didn't.

Re: Period tracking app, Flo, found to be selling user data to Meta

#240

Post by mvdwoord »

sigmoid10 wrote: post #222
lrvick wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is such a thing. FOSS.

Unfortunately, companies like Apple (and soon Google as well) are making this unnecessarily hard in their phone ecosystems.

Well, perhaps they make verifying it hard.. but what is stopping you from publishing an app in the app store, while also hosting the source code for anyone to see, and use? 99 bucks a year?
Post reply on HN