Can we be sure about that?
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Well, perhaps not, but did you read the article? It’s about individuals deleting the app because their data is stored on a server and can be subpoenaed if a court agrees it is evidential, if they are being investigated.
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The scope of our investigation has expanded…
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Periodical, on Android is FOSS. Very provably does not send data home, so it’s just the usual matter of treating your phone as though it stores compromat.
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Indeed - and not just about period tracking:
(My bold in the excerpt quoted)
Abortion and civil rights advocates have warned that there are few federal regulations on what information is collected and retained by tech firms, making it easy for law enforcement officials to access incriminating data on location, internet searches and communication history.
Such data has already been used to prosecute people for miscarriages and pregnancy termination in states with strict abortion laws, including one case in which a woman’s online search for abortion pills was brought against her in court. This kind of legal response may now become more widespread, said Imran Ahmed, chief executive officer of advocacy group the Center for Countering Digital Hate.
“These companies need to think very long and hard about the ways in which their platforms will be weaponized to criminalize people looking to access abortion healthcare, and they need to ensure that it doesn’t happen,” he said.
The bit about location is also worrying - “what were you doing at the [out of state] planned parenthood site shown in your phone’s location history, Ms Doe?”
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This is the part that’s puzzling to me. How can a state prosecute someone for doing something in another state that’s legal there? If I’m in a state where gambling is illegal and I go to Vegas and gamble, how on earth would my state have the right to prosecute me? Heck, there are recreational drugs that are legal in one state but not another. Are those subject to state prosecution now?
I get the lawsuit/harassment BS that Texas is doing. And maybe that’s what’s happening here. But the state of Texas has no compelling interest in my activities in another state.
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I dunno and IANAL but can we imagine a line of attack that says “you are now in Texas and we can prove you had an abortion [where you had it is irrelevant] - so you are guilty under our state laws”?
I doubt it would stand on appeal to any sane appeal court but given that the ultimate appeal court has demonstrably lost its marbles…
And the the fact that this whole judgement rested on a ‘privacy’ right… (from another part of the same article)
The Roe decision has highlighted a longstanding privacy crisis affecting users of the most commonly used tech services, said Ahmed.
“This is very clarifying the extent to which the cost for these free services is held in the data that we willingly give them, which can now be weaponized against us,” he said.
The threat of the fall of Roe, from when the decision was first leaked earlier this year, has intensified calls for federal data privacy legislation. Last week legislators including Senator Elizabeth Warren introduced a bill that would would bar “data brokers from selling or transferring location data and health data”.
“Data brokers profit from the location data of millions of people, posing serious risks to Americans everywhere by selling their most private information,” Warren said in a statement at the time. “With this extremist supreme court poised to overturn Roe v Wade and states seeking to criminalize essential health care, it is more crucial than ever for Congress to protect consumers’ sensitive data.”
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But I don’t think that’s how state laws work, with regard to “Full Faith and Credit” and “horizontal federaliism.” Texas could certainly prosecute someone for conspiring to leave Texas to get an abortion in Colorado. But they can’t prosecute someone for the act of abortion in another state, where it is legal. A state’s authority is limited to its jurisdiction.
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I doubt that will stop them from trying and probably ruining the lives of an awful lot of Black and Brown women in Texas.
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But if the person did have an abortion out of state then de facto they MUST HAVE CONSPIRED TO LEAVE TEXAS to get an abortion out of state.
(IANAL but it looks like the sort of shit some clever-clogs lawyer would come up with)
(You can’t leave Texas without having conspired to leave Texas, and anyone leaving the blessed heaven that is Texas must have been evilly conspiring to do so! /s)
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Agreed, and I think this is the key. It’s more about harassment than prosecution.
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Right, but I do think that some of it will stick with the right kind of judge and/or jury. I don’t think they are interested in the law and abiding by what they set up. I think they are very much of the Jim Crow mindset now, where the laws only apply to certain people in certain ways, and violating those laws will be acceptable for a given outcome.
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Yes, if you commit a crime in one state and flee to another, the jurisdiction where the crime occurred would have to send an arresting officer and request extradition, even within the US. If it’s a federal offense the Marshals can arrest you anywhere.
But the scenario here is a Texas resident going to Colorado for an abortion, then going home and being arrested in Texas.
I dunno but perhaps Colorado clinics may need to start admitting a lot more Jane Does who have been told to leave their phones at home.
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Yes, but that’s different. What we’re discussing is:
Live in Texas, abortion illegal.
Travel to Colorado, abortion is legal, have abortion.
What is Texas’ jurisdiction when you return?
Your example is:
Live in Texas, abortion illegal.
Get abortion in Texas, flee to Colorado.
Texas rings up Colorado and says “hand her over.”
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Hmm, if the crime is “ever having had an abortion” then maybe Texas would have something to charge you with.
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It’s on the list…
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Having an abortion in California (and many other states) is not a crime on California or those other states.
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