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The Privacy Angle

Posted by Matt Birchler
— 2 min read

There were too many links, so I've collected a few in one place.

Olivia Snow: Are You Ready to Be Surveilled Like a Sex Worker?

Neither the intent nor effect of FOSTA or Dobbs is to eradicate sex work or abortions, which have existed for millennia and will continue to exist regardless of legality. Remember: these measures aren’t about the law; they’re about power. Such laws slowly and systemically exclude certain demographics from participation in society by codifying what cultural biases already enforce. Consequently, while some people will face arrest, and many more will live the nightmare of carrying an unwanted or unviable pregnancy to term, the widest-reaching effects of this legislation will be the chilling of free speech and the systemic deplatforming of abortion activists from social media and financial institutions, which will protect themselves from liability at our expense.

David Frum: Roe Is the New Prohibition

Many of the men and women poised to cast Republican ballots in 2022 and 2024 to protest inflation and COVID-19 school closures may be surprised to discover that anti-abortion laws they had assumed were intended only to prohibit others also apply to them. They may be surprised to discover that they could unwittingly put out of business in vitro–fertilization clinics, because in vitro fertilization can involve intentionally destroying fertilized embryos. They may be surprised to discover that a miscarriage can lead to a police investigation. They may be surprised that their employer could face retaliation from lawmakers if it covers the costs of traveling out of state for an abortion. The concept of fetal personhood could, if made axiomatic, impose all kinds of government-enforced limits and restrictions on pregnant women.

John Gruber: Period-Tracking Apps and Data Privacy in Post-Roe America

I don’t mean to glibly suggest that Apple Health is a panacea for this dilemma. It’s certainly worth worrying about which third-party apps you grant access to your Health data, for one thing.

Sarah Perez and Zack Whittaker: Period tracker Stardust surges following Roe reversal, but its privacy claims aren’t airtight

Period tracking app Stardust surged to the top of the U.S. Apple App Store in the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade after the app promised it will encrypt its users’ private data to keep it out of the hands of the government. But TechCrunch found on Monday that the current version of the now-booming Stardust app is sharing the app users’ phone numbers with a third-party analytics company, which could be used to identify individual users of the app.