Grindr is Sharing Users' HIV Status with Other Companies
Hot on the heels of last week's security issues, dating app Grindr is under fire again for inappropriate sharing of HIV status with advertisers and inadequate security on other personal data transmission.
Antoine Pultier, a researcher with Norwegian independent research company SINTEF, warns data on users' HIV testing date and status are sent together alongside other identifying information, such as a user's Global Positioning System location and email.
SINTEF's analysis also showed that Grindr was sharing its users' precise GPS position, "tribe" (meaning what gay subculture they identify with), sexuality, relationship status, ethnicity, and phone ID to other third-party advertising companies.
Grindr, in a statement to BuzzFeed, defended its relationship with Apptimize and Localytics, saying user information is not sold to third parties.
SINTEF's data, which was confirmed by cybersecurity experts, disclosed that Grindr shared its users' precise GPS position, gay subculture, sexuality, relationship status, ethnicity and phone ID to other third-party advertising companies, which unlike HIV data, was shared via plain text - a method that can easily be hacked. "We pay these software vendors to utilise their services".
Apptimize and Localytics did not immediately respond to CNBC's request for comment.
Grindr users can choose from four options when it comes to disclosing HIV status - positive, positive and on HIV treatment, negative or negative and on PrEP.
According to SINTEF, sharing the HIV status with analytics companies was unnecessary and those companies were not certified to hold medical data.
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Buzzfeed News independently confirmed the allegations by the researchers.
The information, excluding HIV statuses, was being transferred via "plain text" format, which BuzzFeed News noted can be "easily hacked".
"What you can see from Chinese intelligence practices is a clear effort to collect a lot of personal information on a lot of different people, and to build a database of names that's potentially useful either for influence or for intelligence", said Peter Mattis, a former USA government intelligence analyst and China fellow at the Jamestown Foundation.
Grindr insists its sole objective for sharing highly sensitive health information is an effort to better the app.
But to send this information in the clear presents a material danger to the many gay people around the world who can not openly identify as such.
Grindr allows users to list their HIV status and last tested date in their profiles.
In response to the news, AIDS advocacy group ACT UP New York's James Krellenstein called Grindr's data sharing "an extremely, extremely egregious breach of basic standards". "Remember that if you choose to include information in your profile, and make your profile public, that information will also become public". A few experts are now arguing that Grindr should be more specific in its user agreements about how its using their data.
"What the law regards as informed consent is in nearly all instances uninformed consent", Ben Wizner, director of the ACLU Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project, told BuzzFeed News.
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