© 2024 Blue Ridge Public Radio
Blue Ridge Mountains banner background
Your source for information and inspiration in Western North Carolina.
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

Don’t Delete Your Period App. Here Are Other Ways to Protect Your Health Data.

In early August, a Nebraskan woman was charged with helping her daughter abort a pregnancy after 20 weeks, which is illegal in the state. A key piece of evidence? Her Facebook messages.

Since the overturn of Roe v. Wade, there is growing concerns about how digital information will be used to prosecute abortions — and how this affects both abortion seekers and those who provide abortion care and support.

Host Anita Rao talks with Amanda Bennett, project manager at the Digital Defense Fund, and Kestrel, an abortion doula and member of the Mountain Area Abortion Doula Collective in Western North Carolina, about best practices for keeping personal information safe from hackers and third party surveillance. And Dr. Olivia Snow, a dominatrix and research fellow at the UCLA Center For Critical Internet Inquiry, talks about the lessons sex workers have to share about protection from digital surveillance.

Three Ways to Protect Your Privacy Online

Secure Your Communications

  1. Use an end-to-end encrypted messaging app, like Signal. End-to-end encryption prevents third parties from accessing data sent from one party to another.
  • Secure Your Device

    1. Make sure your phone, computer or other device has a PIN or password.
    2. Encrypt the device. This means any data entered into the device will be indecipherable without a password or other key.
  • Secure Your Browsing

    1. Use a secure web browser such as Tor or Brave. Secure browsing is *not* the same as incognito mode. Using a VPN also adds security.

    Copyright 2022 North Carolina Public Radio. To see more, visit North Carolina Public Radio.

    Kaia Findlay is a producer for The State of Things, WUNC's daily, live talk show. Kaia grew up in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in a household filled with teachers and storytellers. In elementary school, she usually fell asleep listening to recordings of 1950s radio comedy programs. After a semester of writing for her high school newspaper, she decided she hated journalism. While pursuing her bachelor’s in environmental studies at UNC-Chapel Hill, she got talked back into it. Kaia received a master’s degree from the UNC Hussman School of Journalism, where she focused on reporting and science communication. She has published stories with Our State Magazine, Indy Week, and HuffPost. She most recently worked as the manager for a podcast on environmental sustainability and higher education. Her reporting passions include climate and the environment, health and science, food and women’s issues. When not working at WUNC, Kaia goes pebble-wrestling, takes long bike rides, and reads while hammocking.
    Anita Rao is the host and creator of "Embodied," a live, weekly radio show and seasonal podcast about sex, relationships & health. She's also the managing editor of WUNC's on-demand content. She has traveled the country recording interviews for the Peabody Award-winning StoryCorps production department, founded and launched a podcast about millennial feminism in the South, and served as the managing editor and regular host of "The State of Things," North Carolina Public Radio's flagship daily, live talk show. Anita was born in a small coal-mining town in Northeast England but spent most of her life growing up in Iowa and has a fond affection for the Midwest.