Womens’ Reproductive Rights in the Digital Age: The FemTech Data Privacy Dilemma
- bilsociety20
- 6 mar
- Tempo di lettura: 2 min
by Ginevra Nanni
Period-tracking apps are essential tools for millions of women, yet they operate in a legal grey area. Unlike healthcare providers, most FemTech companies are not bound by stringent medical data protections. As a result, highly intimate information such as sexual activity, cycle irregularities and pregnancy intentions can be collected, stored and shared with third parties.
Following the rollback of abortion rights in several countries, including the overturning of Roe v. Wade in the U.S., concerns have grown that such data could be accessed by law enforcement to infer pregnancy, miscarriage or attempts to obtain an abortion. Users often underestimate the scale of data collection. In 2021, Flo was found to have shared users’ health data with third parties despite explicit privacy assurances. A subsequent audit revealed that 87% of menstrual-tracking apps transmit data to external companies without users’ clear understanding or consent. These findings illustrate how easily sensitive reproductive information can circulate beyond users’ control.
What appears to be a harmless health tool can operate as a surveillance mechanism. In many jurisdictions, menstrual and fertility data are not clearly classified as sensitive health data, meaning they may receive weaker protection than traditional medical records. In the EU and UK, uncertainty persists over whether such data fall within GDPR “special category” protections or under medical regulatory frameworks overseen by the MHRA (the UK Medicines & Healthcare products Regulatory Agency). When reproductive data can be commercialised or weaponised, women’s bodily autonomy is undermined, exposing users to profiling, discrimination and potential legal consequences.
To ensure FemTech empowers users, reproductive data must receive heightened legal protection. Companies should adopt strict data minimisation, full encryption, transparent consent mechanisms and firm limits on third-party sharing. Without meaningful safeguards, FemTech risks compromising the very rights it claims to support.
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