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WASHINGTON, Aug. 11 (AP) — The case of a Nebraska woman accused of helping her teenage daughter end her pregnancy has sparked charges against Luo after investigators obtained Facebook messages between the two. New concerns over data privacy in the world.
Since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the Roe v. Wade case in June, big tech companies that collect users’ personal details have faced new calls to limit such tracking and surveillance amid concerns that the data could be used by law enforcement or vigilantes A treasure trove to deal with those seeking abortion or those trying to help them.
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Meta, which owns Facebook, said Tuesday that it received a June 7 search warrant from local law enforcement for information on the Nebraska case before the Supreme Court overturned Roe’s decision.
The company added that the search warrant “didn’t mention abortion at all,” and court documents at the time showed police were investigating “the alleged unlawful burning and burial of stillborn babies.”
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However, in early June, the mother and daughter were charged with only one felony count of removing, concealing or abandoning a body, and two misdemeanors: concealing the death of another and falsely reporting.
It wasn’t until about a month later, after investigators reviewed private Facebook messages, that prosecutors added abortion-related felony charges against the mother.
History has proven time and time again that whenever people’s personal data is tracked and stored, there is a risk of misuse or misuse. As the Supreme Court struck down the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling that legalized abortion, collected location data, text messages, search histories, emails, and seemingly innocuous period and ovulation tracking apps could be used to sue people seeking abortion or medical treatment of people taking care of miscarriages — and the people who help them.
“In the digital age, this decision opens the door for law enforcement and private bounty hunters to seek out vast amounts of private data from ordinary Americans,” said Alexandra Alexander, president and CEO of the Washington-based Center for Democracy and Technology. Alexandra Reeve Givens said. Digital Rights Nonprofit.
Why did Facebook forward these messages?
Facebook’s owner Meta said it received a legal warrant from law enforcement in the case, which did not mention the word “abortion.”
The company said officials at the social media giant “always carefully scrutinize every government request we receive to make sure it’s legitimate and valid,” and Meta would push back against requests it deems invalid or overly broad.
But the company provided investigators with information about 88 percent of the 59,996 cases in which the government requested data in the second half of last year, according to its Transparency Report.
Meta declined to say whether it would have responded differently if the warrant mentioned the word “abortion.”
not a new problem
According to a recent survey, until May of this year, anyone could buy a trove of weekly client data at more than 600 family planning centers across the country for as little as $160.
The documents included approximate patient addresses — from where their phones “slept” at night — income brackets, time spent at the clinic and the main places people visited before and after.
This is all possible because federal laws—specifically HIPAA, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996—protect the privacy of your doctor’s office medical records, but not third-party apps or tech companies collecting them any information about you.
The same is true if the app collecting your data shares it with third parties who may misuse it.
In 2017, a black Mississippi woman named Letis Fisher was charged with second-degree murder after seeking medical care for a miscarriage.
“While receiving the care of medical staff, she was also immediately treated for the alleged crime,” Cynthia Conti-Cook, a civil rights lawyer and Ford Foundation researcher, wrote in her 2020 paper, “Monitoring a Digital Abortion Diary.”
Fisher’s “statements to nurses, medical records, and autopsy records of the fetus were all handed over to local police to investigate whether she intentionally killed the fetus,” she wrote.
Fisher was charged with second-degree murder in 2018; a conviction could lead to life in prison.
The murder charge was later dismissed. Evidence against her included her online search history, which included queries about how to induce a miscarriage and how to buy abortion pills online.
“Her digital data provides prosecutors with a window into (her) soul to corroborate the general theory that they do not want the fetus to survive,” Conti-Cook wrote.
Industry Response
While many companies have announced policies to protect their own employees by paying for necessary out-of-state travel to obtain abortions, tech companies have said little about how they are cooperating with law enforcement or government agencies in trying to prosecute people seeking abortions, which is illegal – or who is helping someone do it.
In June, Democratic lawmakers asked federal regulators to investigate Apple and Google for allegedly defrauding millions of mobile phone users by allowing the collection and sale of personal data to third parties.
The following month, Google announced that it would automatically clear information about users visiting abortion clinics or other locations that could raise legal questions after the Supreme Court ruling.
Governments and law enforcement can subpoena companies to obtain data on their users. In general, Big Tech’s policy suggests companies will comply with abortion-related data requests unless they feel they are too broad.
For example, Meta points to its online transparency report saying that “we will only comply with government requests for user information if we have a good faith belief that the law requires us to do so”.
Online activists say that’s not enough. For example, in the Nebraska case, if messages are “end-to-end encrypted,” as messages on Meta’s WhatsApp service are protected by default, neither Meta nor law enforcement can read them.
“Meta has to flip the switch to make end-to-end encryption the default for all private messages, including Facebook and Instagram. Doing so could actually save the life of a pregnant woman,” said Campaign and Managing Director of Fight for the Future, a nonprofit rights group Manager Caitlin Seeley-George said.
User burden
Unless all your data is securely encrypted, there will always be someone accessing it somewhere.
As a result, abortion rights activists suggest that in states that ban abortion, people should limit the creation of such data in the first place.
They urge, for example, to turn off cell phone location services when seeking reproductive health care — or just leave your phone at home. To be safe, they say, it’s best to read the privacy policy of any health app you’re using.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation recommends using more privacy-focused web browsers such as Brave, Firefox, and DuckDuckGo, but also recommends double-checking their privacy settings.
There are also ways to turn off advertising identifiers on Apple and Android phones to stop advertisers from tracking you.
It’s usually a good idea anyway. Every time you download a new app, Apple will ask you if you want to be tracked. Tracking can be turned off manually for apps you have installed. (Associated Press)
(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from the Syndicated News feed, the body of the content may not have been modified or edited by LatestLY staff)
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