This App Knows Users’ Masturbation Habits – and Now So Can the World

​One of the unintended consequences of living in the digital age is that everything, sooner or later, becomes quantified as a data point. That now includes – insert “Rated R” warning here – an app user’s masturbation frequency. (Exercising great discipline, we will resist the temptation to make tasteless puns throughout this piece, though they practically write themselves. So, use your imagination.)

Back to the story – addictions of many sorts are as old as humanity. If there’s a silver lining to the otherwise debatable benefits of social media, it may be the proliferation of apps now claiming to offer support for those who seek to overcome their habits. That includes the category of sexual addiction to pornography and masturbation.

404 Media, which originally broke the story, says that an app devoted to helping users defeat their porn addiction is inadvertently sharing related data. This includes how often users look at porn, how they respond, and how it makes them feel when they do. 404 says the story is “a good reminder to think twice before giving any app your personal information.”

The data also includes the users’ age. 404 Media’s reporting suggests that many of the affected users described themselves as minors – as many as 100,000 of the 600,000 whose records proved to be accessible. These vulnerabilities were apparently first reported to the app maker by an independent security researcher in September.

To date, however, the company has not resolved the issue. In fact, its founder has dismissed the allegations as “a bit of a joke,” suggesting the potential for a data leak was faked. For privacy reasons, 404 isn’t naming the app. The root cause of this vulnerability is a long-understood flaw in Google Firebase, which is used by developers to build apps. This flaw is therefore easily replicated by experts. In other words, it’s no joke.

The report indicates that for reasons unknown, Google itself hasn’t fixed the issue. But it’s even more curious that all app makers and even app marketplaces – in whose trust users place their data – haven’t done so, either. All of which means that when it comes to data security, an entry made in confidence can amount to global oversharing.

"The data they can get on what motivates you, what actually makes you take an action – that's so valuable," says technology journalist Elaine Burke. “This is [about] so much more than what your browsing habits are and what you're interested in.” She warns that developers are sold on the notion that humans are “mathematical problems that can be solved with the right metric.”

This story points to the larger issue of falsely believing that when it comes to defeating age-old personal issues in the 21st century, it’s as simple as thinking there’s an app for that. That impulse leads many to unknowingly risk their most personal data with the tap of a digital button. The promise is self-control. But the price might be a loss of privacy.

This demolition of personal privacy by datapoint is made worse by the regular practice of a dozen federal agencies – ranging from the FBI to the IRS – to purchase Americans’ private digital information from data brokers and review it at will. That is all the more reason for Congress to pass a law that imposes a probable-cause warrant requirement before agencies can inspect Americans’ most private information.
​
In the meantime, practice caveat venditor: seller beware – especially when the product is you.

DONATE & HELP US DEFEND YOUR FOURTH AMENDMENT RIGHTS