In a study conducted by researchers from King’s College London and University College London (UCL) of 20 leading female health apps available in the UK and US, researchers found a trend of coercing users into revealing sensitive information, potentially jeopardising their privacy and safety.

One of the discoveries was that many apps handling medical and fertility data lacked data deletion functions, making it difficult for users to remove entered information. 

Even more concerning was that some pregnancy-tracking apps required users to disclose past miscarriages or abortions, a practice with significant privacy and safety implications, especially in regions where such information could lead to legal ramifications. 

“Requiring users to disclose sensitive or potentially criminalising information as a pre-condition to deleting data is an extremely poor privacy practice with dire safety implications. It removes any form of meaningful consent offered to users,” Dr Ruba Abu-Salma, Department of Informatics at King’s College London.

The study also revealed a significant disparity between the wording of privacy policies and in-app features, with many apps engaging in covert data gathering and third-party sharing without explicit user consent. 

According to the study, 35% of apps claimed not to share personal data with third parties in the data safety sections, but contradicted this in their privacy policies. 45% of privacy policies emphasised lack of responsibility for the practices of any third parties, despite also claiming to vet them. 

Half of the apps provided explicit assurance that users’ health data would not be shared with advertisers, however, they were ambiguous about whether this would also include data collected through the app. 

“There is a tendency by app developers to treat period and fertility data as ‘another piece of data’ as opposed to uniquely sensitive data which has the potential to stigmatise or criminalise users,” said Lisa Malki, first author on the paper and former research assistant at King’s.

In response to these findings, the researchers have developed a resource to help improve the privacy policies and practices of female health apps. They are also calling for critical discussions on how health apps, including fitness and mental health apps, handle sensitive data.