10 ms·

Data broker is selling location data of people who visit abortion clinics

125 points by thamer 4y ago

MomoXenosaga 4y ago
Don't worry abortion will be illegal soon. I have always wondered if in the long run it would have been better if Lincoln actually lost the Civil war. The Blue states would be free from the conservatives.
- umvi 4y ago
  Even if Roe v Wade is appealed, that does not mean abortion will automatically be illegal. It means it will be left up to state governments to decide. California, for example, will almost certainly have legal abortion. > I have always wondered if in the long run it would have been better if Lincoln actually lost the Civil war. The Blue states would be free from the conservatives. Come on, abortion and slavery aren't even comparable. In one case people are potentially blocked from access to post-conception birth control, and in the other case actual humans were enslaved and bred for profit.
  - gscott 4y ago
    All States have to do is make a law that says if you travel for abortion you can be charged for murder if you come back to the state. That will tie a bow on fanatics fever dreams of no abortions under any circumstance.
    - etskinner 4y ago
      Is that legal? My understanding is that they don't have jurisdiction beyond their borders. That would be like saying if you consume cannabis in a state where it's legal and then go back to a state where it's not, they could charge you.
      - toomuchtodo 4y ago
        https://www.politico.com/news/2022/03/19/travel-abortion-law-missouri-00018539 https://www.politico.com/news/2022/03/19/travel-abortion-law...
        everforward 4y ago
        I don't think that will apply here. What those states are doing is pushing enforcement off onto private citizens, who aren't bound by Roe v Wade. Private citizens can't enforce criminal penalties, so you can't use those kinds of laws to hand out prison sentences or executions. Still a valid point about the expansion of anti-abortion laws, though.
  - sofixa 4y ago
    > Even if Roe v Wade is appealed, that does not mean abortion will automatically be illegal I read somewhere that there are already a bunch of states (in the 20s) with laws on the books prohibiting abortions if the federal precedent disappears.
  - floor2 4y ago
    > abortion and slavery aren't even comparable Funny connection between the two regarding "who deserves human rights" though. In the 1700s people said slaves weren't really fully human and deserving of rights. Today people say unborn babies aren't really fully human and deserving of rights. Maybe someday civil rights will progress to include the unborn. It's taken centuries to get to a society where all races, all religions, all genders, etc have full rights, maybe in 2100 the unborn rights movement will win out and our grandchildren will think we were unimaginable bigots.
    - czzr 4y ago
      Doubtful. Unless you think in 2100 that rape victims will be forced to carry babies to term and people will mourn early miscarriages as if a toddler died. I would be extremely surprised.
    - trasz 4y ago
      It doesn’t matter if fetuses are people. What does matter is if people who don’t want to be pregnant are people. Because abortion ban denies them their right to decide about their bodies. Abortion ban is just yet another form of religiously motivated organized stupidity. It’s no different from LGBT discrimination.
  - monocasa 4y ago
    The leaked opinion is compatible with future US code that makes abortion federally illegal. It sort of goes out of it's way to not restrict federal power in the matter (despite going on and on about states' rights as a proxy for legitimacy from the citizens), but instead mainly attacks the idea of the constitution containing an intrinsic right to privacy.
  - raxxorraxor 4y ago
    Ideally neither should be of too much relevance and society should form a consensus. But otherwise a responsibility on the federal level makes much more sense if a consensus is formed and put into law. Not from the US though.
- ARandomerDude 4y ago
  > The Blue states would be free from the conservatives. And vice versa.
- giraffe_lady 4y ago
  Heart of american liberalism right there. "Other people living under slavery is better than me having to deal with the political consequences of ending it." Same shit continues really. The "blue states" might be "free" of "the conservatives" even now, but what about the people living in those states? Abortion isn't even that overwhelmingly unpopular in the south, those states are just gerrymandered to shit and under effective voter suppression. But hey that's their business right let's just leave them to it.
nameless912 4y ago
Someone buy this and cross reference it with publicly available information about Republican lawmakers. I'm certain you'll find more than a few pings.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- timintheglades 4y ago
- kurupt213 4y ago
  All uses of this information are bad; there isn’t an exception for alignment with your politics
  - chomp 4y ago
    You are not a moral arbiter. Moralism is relative - some people will find it quite ethical to make sure that the people in power are being held to the same standard as their constituents. Especially when those people in power are removing autonomy from people. AND especially when those people in power can keep their autonomy by ensuring they can travel to blue states or overseas in case they need more freedom.
    - throwawayacc2 4y ago
      - elliekelly 4y ago
        You can’t murder a clump of cells. Otherwise the treatment for cancer or a yeast infection would result in a prison sentence.
        throwawayacc2 4y ago
        I think this fundamental difference in morality is why your country will fall apart.
olliej 4y ago
As long as spying on people is for some reason legal this will continue to happen. Phones need to ban location access for anything that doesn’t need location to function. Given we have them, App Stores need to ban apps that are spy.
- snarf21 4y ago
  You are forgetting that phones are pinging every tower constantly. Turning off location services is almost meaningless. The carriers know far more about you. If you want privacy, leave your phone at home or put it in a cage.
  - throwaway0a5e 4y ago
    The carrier doesn't know if you're in the abortion clinic or the chinese buffet is shares the strip mall with. You need GPS (or a much denser network) to have high precision. Edit: and yes I know 5g increases the resolution, but it's still not that good since cell density correlates with "stuff" density"
    - adamrezich 4y ago
      good thing telecoms & phone manufacturers aren't trying to roll out such a network or anything like that
  - Bud 4y ago
    Or, instead of just giving up on modern life and modern technology, we could express the appropriate level of outrage, and vow to make this kind of conduct a felony, and then vow to jail the people selling this data for 25 years or whenever their bodies reach room temperature, whichever comes first. That would be another choice we could make.
    - marssaxman 4y ago
      You and I could make such vows all day long without changing anything about the world we live in.
nickthegreek 4y ago
"It costs just over $160 to get a week's worth of data on where people who visited Planned Parenthood came from, and where they went afterwards."
- abirch 4y ago
  This is why you should disable for all of your apps that require your location permission. If you have a weather app that has your permission, they're probably working with IBM to sell your location data. Edit: forgot location just said permission.
  - beached_whale 4y ago
    Not just location, wifi and bt and probaly network as using wifi will generally give away a location too. It’s not easy.
    - derwiki 4y ago
      My faraday cage phone bag is starting to seem less tinfoil hatty every week
      - kylehotchkiss 4y ago
        For real - i have one of Pacsafe's[1] on hand for international travel where the phone tracking scares me even more than US' domestic situation [1]: https://int.pacsafe.com/collections/rfid-blocking-wallets/products/silent-pocket-faraday-phone-guard https://int.pacsafe.com/collections/rfid-blocking-wallets/pr...
    - sofixa 4y ago
      That's why the Android "location" permission is needed for access to location services, Bluetooth, and WiFi.
      - beached_whale 4y ago
MisterBastahrd 4y ago
Time to freely disseminate lists of data brokers (and their acquaintances) who sell location data of people who visit abortion clinics.
secondcoming 4y ago
Another Vice article about the same thing [0]. It seems they have discovered that location data is sold. [0] https://www.vice.com/en/article/m7vymn/cdc-tracked-phones-location-data-curfews https://www.vice.com/en/article/m7vymn/cdc-tracked-phones-lo...
rapjr9 4y ago
So it seems obvious that this is not the only questionable use location data is being put to. Businesses could buy location tracks on competitors to find out if they are having health problems or to blackmail them. Criminals could use it for blackmail. Foreign governments could use it for blackmail and to build contact networks for people of interest. People could find out which politicians attend neo-nazi meetings. Dead drops for bribery money could be discovered by journalists. Infidelities could be tracked. There are likely many many uses. Apparently the data is easily available. So misuse is likely widespread already. Much of the data is archived and could be mined for any use in the future.
trasz 4y ago
Useful listing of the scumbags responsible: https://twitter.com/nandoodles/status/1521581893438754817 https://twitter.com/nandoodles/status/1521581893438754817 Also - is it just me, or did this one never got to the front page despite quite some upvotes?

125 points by thamer 4y ago

Don't worry abortion will be illegal soon. I have always wondered if in the long run it would have been better if Lincoln actually lost the Civil war. The Blue states would be free from the conservatives.

umvi 4y ago
Even if Roe v Wade is appealed, that does not mean abortion will automatically be illegal. It means it will be left up to state governments to decide. California, for example, will almost certainly have legal abortion. > I have always wondered if in the long run it would have been better if Lincoln actually lost the Civil war. The Blue states would be free from the conservatives. Come on, abortion and slavery aren't even comparable. In one case people are potentially blocked from access to post-conception birth control, and in the other case actual humans were enslaved and bred for profit.
- gscott 4y ago
  All States have to do is make a law that says if you travel for abortion you can be charged for murder if you come back to the state. That will tie a bow on fanatics fever dreams of no abortions under any circumstance.
  - etskinner 4y ago
    Is that legal? My understanding is that they don't have jurisdiction beyond their borders. That would be like saying if you consume cannabis in a state where it's legal and then go back to a state where it's not, they could charge you.
    - toomuchtodo 4y ago
      https://www.politico.com/news/2022/03/19/travel-abortion-law-missouri-00018539 https://www.politico.com/news/2022/03/19/travel-abortion-law...
      - everforward 4y ago
        I don't think that will apply here. What those states are doing is pushing enforcement off onto private citizens, who aren't bound by Roe v Wade. Private citizens can't enforce criminal penalties, so you can't use those kinds of laws to hand out prison sentences or executions. Still a valid point about the expansion of anti-abortion laws, though.
- sofixa 4y ago
  > Even if Roe v Wade is appealed, that does not mean abortion will automatically be illegal I read somewhere that there are already a bunch of states (in the 20s) with laws on the books prohibiting abortions if the federal precedent disappears.
- floor2 4y ago
  > abortion and slavery aren't even comparable Funny connection between the two regarding "who deserves human rights" though. In the 1700s people said slaves weren't really fully human and deserving of rights. Today people say unborn babies aren't really fully human and deserving of rights. Maybe someday civil rights will progress to include the unborn. It's taken centuries to get to a society where all races, all religions, all genders, etc have full rights, maybe in 2100 the unborn rights movement will win out and our grandchildren will think we were unimaginable bigots.
  - czzr 4y ago
    Doubtful. Unless you think in 2100 that rape victims will be forced to carry babies to term and people will mourn early miscarriages as if a toddler died. I would be extremely surprised.
  - trasz 4y ago
    It doesn’t matter if fetuses are people. What does matter is if people who don’t want to be pregnant are people. Because abortion ban denies them their right to decide about their bodies. Abortion ban is just yet another form of religiously motivated organized stupidity. It’s no different from LGBT discrimination.
- monocasa 4y ago
  The leaked opinion is compatible with future US code that makes abortion federally illegal. It sort of goes out of it's way to not restrict federal power in the matter (despite going on and on about states' rights as a proxy for legitimacy from the citizens), but instead mainly attacks the idea of the constitution containing an intrinsic right to privacy.
- raxxorraxor 4y ago
  Ideally neither should be of too much relevance and society should form a consensus. But otherwise a responsibility on the federal level makes much more sense if a consensus is formed and put into law. Not from the US though.
ARandomerDude 4y ago
> The Blue states would be free from the conservatives. And vice versa.
giraffe_lady 4y ago
Heart of american liberalism right there. "Other people living under slavery is better than me having to deal with the political consequences of ending it." Same shit continues really. The "blue states" might be "free" of "the conservatives" even now, but what about the people living in those states? Abortion isn't even that overwhelmingly unpopular in the south, those states are just gerrymandered to shit and under effective voter suppression. But hey that's their business right let's just leave them to it.

nameless912 4y ago

Someone buy this and cross reference it with publicly available information about Republican lawmakers. I'm certain you'll find more than a few pings.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
timintheglades 4y ago
kurupt213 4y ago
All uses of this information are bad; there isn’t an exception for alignment with your politics
- chomp 4y ago
  You are not a moral arbiter. Moralism is relative - some people will find it quite ethical to make sure that the people in power are being held to the same standard as their constituents. Especially when those people in power are removing autonomy from people. AND especially when those people in power can keep their autonomy by ensuring they can travel to blue states or overseas in case they need more freedom.
  - throwawayacc2 4y ago
    - elliekelly 4y ago
      You can’t murder a clump of cells. Otherwise the treatment for cancer or a yeast infection would result in a prison sentence.
      - throwawayacc2 4y ago
        I think this fundamental difference in morality is why your country will fall apart.

olliej 4y ago

As long as spying on people is for some reason legal this will continue to happen. Phones need to ban location access for anything that doesn’t need location to function. Given we have them, App Stores need to ban apps that are spy.

snarf21 4y ago
You are forgetting that phones are pinging every tower constantly. Turning off location services is almost meaningless. The carriers know far more about you. If you want privacy, leave your phone at home or put it in a cage.
- throwaway0a5e 4y ago
  The carrier doesn't know if you're in the abortion clinic or the chinese buffet is shares the strip mall with. You need GPS (or a much denser network) to have high precision. Edit: and yes I know 5g increases the resolution, but it's still not that good since cell density correlates with "stuff" density"
  - adamrezich 4y ago
    good thing telecoms & phone manufacturers aren't trying to roll out such a network or anything like that
- Bud 4y ago
  Or, instead of just giving up on modern life and modern technology, we could express the appropriate level of outrage, and vow to make this kind of conduct a felony, and then vow to jail the people selling this data for 25 years or whenever their bodies reach room temperature, whichever comes first. That would be another choice we could make.
  - marssaxman 4y ago
    You and I could make such vows all day long without changing anything about the world we live in.

nickthegreek 4y ago

"It costs just over $160 to get a week's worth of data on where people who visited Planned Parenthood came from, and where they went afterwards."

abirch 4y ago
This is why you should disable for all of your apps that require your location permission. If you have a weather app that has your permission, they're probably working with IBM to sell your location data. Edit: forgot location just said permission.
- beached_whale 4y ago
  Not just location, wifi and bt and probaly network as using wifi will generally give away a location too. It’s not easy.
  - derwiki 4y ago
    My faraday cage phone bag is starting to seem less tinfoil hatty every week
    - kylehotchkiss 4y ago
      For real - i have one of Pacsafe's[1] on hand for international travel where the phone tracking scares me even more than US' domestic situation [1]: https://int.pacsafe.com/collections/rfid-blocking-wallets/products/silent-pocket-faraday-phone-guard https://int.pacsafe.com/collections/rfid-blocking-wallets/pr...
  - sofixa 4y ago
    That's why the Android "location" permission is needed for access to location services, Bluetooth, and WiFi.
    - beached_whale 4y ago

MisterBastahrd 4y ago

Time to freely disseminate lists of data brokers (and their acquaintances) who sell location data of people who visit abortion clinics.

secondcoming 4y ago

Another Vice article about the same thing [0]. It seems they have discovered that location data is sold. [0] https://www.vice.com/en/article/m7vymn/cdc-tracked-phones-location-data-curfews https://www.vice.com/en/article/m7vymn/cdc-tracked-phones-lo...

rapjr9 4y ago

So it seems obvious that this is not the only questionable use location data is being put to. Businesses could buy location tracks on competitors to find out if they are having health problems or to blackmail them. Criminals could use it for blackmail. Foreign governments could use it for blackmail and to build contact networks for people of interest. People could find out which politicians attend neo-nazi meetings. Dead drops for bribery money could be discovered by journalists. Infidelities could be tracked. There are likely many many uses. Apparently the data is easily available. So misuse is likely widespread already. Much of the data is archived and could be mined for any use in the future.

trasz 4y ago

Useful listing of the scumbags responsible: https://twitter.com/nandoodles/status/1521581893438754817 https://twitter.com/nandoodles/status/1521581893438754817 Also - is it just me, or did this one never got to the front page despite quite some upvotes?