Health apps can provide information and motivation to help you manage your wellbeing, and they're easy to use and often free. But they may not be protecting your privacy as a priority. Health apps collect all sorts of personal information, like your name, email address, age, height and weight. Others get even more detailed, depending on the focus of the app; fertility apps, for instance, allow you to enter details of your menstrual cycle, and exercise apps allow you to post the route of your daily jog.
An analysis of 43 wellness apps by the nonprofit Privacy Rights Clearinghouse found many apps connect to advertising and data analysis sites without the user's knowledge. They often transmit unencrypted data over insecure network, possibly including your medical and pharmaceutical search terms, like those for sexually transmitted diseases or antipsychotic drugs.
It's easy for others on a network to read what's being transmitted , said Craig Michael Lie Njie, a consultant who did the technical analysis for the report.
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