According to the privacy paradox we prioritize convenience over privacy. During my conversations with people about period apps, they often ask if I track my period. Many are aware of the fact that I value my privacy and have strong views about how personal data processing. Therefore they sometimes I assume I do not use any apps that use and sell my personal data.
It is true that I value my privacy. I really love talking and thinking about data protection and how to apply privacy legislation in practice. I also believe that privacy is an important right that enables us to live an autonomous life. And I worry about the way we are used as vehicles to supply data to companies that use our data to profile us and sell us things we do not really need.
However, my love for privacy has never led me to dislike technology. My privacy concerns regarding the use of data do not always triumph over other important reasons for using apps. I think this is the case for many. This is often referred to as the privacy paradox. We prioritize the conveniences of certain technologies over finding alternative privacy friendly tools.
Often this leads people to falsely assume that this must mean I in fact do not care that much about privacy, since I use apps that not always value mine.
There have been numerous times in my life where technology has clearly and significantly improved my life. Technology has made me happier, healthier and consistently makes me laugh (by enabling constant sharing of memes with my sister). However, in reality people choose to use technology based on needs and values that are important to them.
Why I started tracking my period
In the summer of 2022, a number of significant seemingly unrelated events happened at the same time. Together they inspired me to create The Digital Period to discuss the role of technology in our lives. One of the significant events that happened in 2022, was that I stopped having migraines. This was significant because I have been getting migraines since I was about twelve years old (around the same time I started to get my period). The older I got, the more frequent they became.
By 2022 I was very used to having migraines. They were a natural part of my life and I had built my life around it. For those who are unfamiliar with migraines, a migraine is a neurological disease that often leads to severe headaches, nausea, and a sensitivity to light, noise and/or smells. It affects around 1 in every 5 women and around 1 in every 15 men. Most people cannot continue their day to day activities when suffering from an attack.
Like many people with migraines, I often received well intentioned advice about how to live my life. Many recommended me to ‘simply not be so busy all the time’, as surely, they thought, that would be partially the cause of my migraines. In 2020, the first year of the pandemic, I was having the quietest and calmest year of my life. 2020 forced me to mostly stay in my house and stroll around my neighbourhood. Unfortunately though, the migraines did not stop. It turned out my busy life was really not causing them.
In an effort to increase my understanding of my migraines, my doctor suggested I would track them. As for many things in life, there is an app for that. I tracked my migraines throughout 2020. Tracking my migraines included tracking a bunch of other things, such as my menstruation cycle. While the exact relation between migraines and hormones is unclear, it is clear that they have something to do with each other.
Towards understanding your body
Tracking increased my understanding of my body. Health data also helped my doctor understand much better what I was going through, what affected it and what could help. When people say they use tracking apps because they are just so convenient, it is easy to shrug that off as a silly reason to use potentially invasive apps. Convenience, however, is not necessarily a form of luxury. Without the easily and readily available tool of an app on your phone, I could have never tracked my condition as well as I did.
As a result of the insights received through the tracking app I have received different medication that has helped reduce my migraines greatly in 2021, and in 2022 and up to this day I hardly get any.
The improvement of the quality of life has been absolutely amazing. Technology can be a wonderful tool to improve a life in a meaningful way. Sharing personal data can be beneficial and even necessary to improve someone’s life.
The privacy paradox
When I was looking for an app to track my migraines and cycle I did not pay attention to the privacy policies of the apps I was considering. Not because I didn’t care. I do, but I needed an easily accessible tool. As I wrote in the beginning, I really do care about privacy, but this is sometimes difficult to tell when looking at my behaviour. Once we look a little further, it becomes clear that the need for convenience is often entangled in a broader need. It is extremely convenient to have something that you have with you all the time, like your phone, and that you can easily use, even when having a migraine.
I think ‘convenience’ doesn’t quite convey the true motivations and values behind choosing to use certain tools. There is often something more important that motivates someone to use something. If I did not have something like that at my disposal I would not be able to track my migraines. The choice is not between convenience or privacy. It is about choosing for improving your health (period apps), being included in your group of friends or family (WhatsApp), promoting your business (Instagram) etcetera. People do value privacy, but they also value other things. And besides that, alternative privacy friendly tools do not always exist and/or are difficult to find.
Values and technology
So yes, I do track my period and I (still) use an app to do so.
I have used various apps. Tracking has helped me understand my body much better. It has improved my health greatly. At the same time, many apps still have many flaws, ranging from practical flaws (not very user friendly), and much more problematic flaws (such as selling data to third parties).
When we zoom out, we can also question practices and cultural norms that impact the design and business models behind these apps. I am not doing this project, because I dislike technology. The opposite is true. I have created this project because I think technology can really improve our lives. Technology is created by us. When we realize the flaws within and around the things we create, we can correct them.
In the conversations I have with people about their use of period apps we explore why they use these apps. We try to look further than convenience. Understanding our individual values can help us understand how to improve technology. So that we can keep the aspect we like, but also improve those aspects that do not work for us.