Friend –

We all know it: Reproductive freedom is at stake for so many folks across the U.S. But it could get worse.

The Comstock Act is a “zombie” law that has flown under the radar for the past 50 or so years, largely because it was previously rendered unconstitutional by Roe v. Wade. The law prohibits the mailing of “obscene” materials (including birth control medications) and “instruments” used for abortion. The Biden Administration has refused to enforce the Comstock Act, but a future president seeking to limit reproductive freedom could very easily do so – with devastating effects on the availability of reproductive health care nationwide. In fact, Trump has already floated the idea of doing so in a recent Time magazine interview. [1]

These days, we need to understand that the threat of Comstock is not just a reproductive rights issue—it’s also about accountability from Big Tech companies. When Comstock was enacted, telegrams were the major form of nationwide communication, but now, virtually everything we do online is tracked and stored by Big Tech companies. And all of this data is evidence that government officials can, and will, use to prosecute abortion.

And right now, Big Tech’s surveillance practices are already putting abortion seekers at risk. Tech companies’ business models rely on collecting, storing, and selling as much user data as possible. And despite promises to the contrary, we know that many of them are still hoarding abortion seekers’ sensitive location and search history data.

As I wrote in a recent op-ed for Fast Company, we know this because we’ve tested it. Google is still collecting and retaining location history data for abortion clinic visits despite the company’s policy update in July 2022 to “delete these entries from Location History soon after they visit…in the coming weeks." [2]

We also know from published research that Meta, the parent company of Facebook, has provided private user content like location, search, and messaging history to law enforcement officials seeking to prosecute abortion cases. [3]

If the Comstock Act is revived, we worry the volume of our private information that Big Tech companies provide to law enforcement authorities could rise significantly. If we want to protect abortion seekers, we have to enshrine reproductive rights and take on Big Tech’s business model.

Friend, we’re a pretty small advocacy organization with a staff of only twelve people to conduct our research and call out these giant corporations, but we’re punching well above our weight on this issue. We were the first nonprofit to call out Google for retaining abortion seekers’ location data, and our projects have received major national news coverage from outlets like NBC News, The Guardian, and The Washington Post. [4] [5] [6]

So I hope you’re able to chip in a donation today to support our work. Your contribution will support our staff to expand these experiments and continue exposing how the tech companies’ hoarding of our personal data is putting abortion seekers at grave risk.

Thank you for everything you do to help fight back against Big Tech companies,

Nicole Gill
Co-founder and Executive Director
Accountable Tech

Sources:

1. Time: What Trump’s Abortion Comments to TIME Reveal About His Plans For a Second Term
2. Accountable Tech: As Google Rolls Out New Privacy Commitments, Research Finds Company is Still Failing to Protect Privacy of Abortion Seekers
3. Mashable: Police are using Facebook chat logs to prosecute abortion seekers
4. NBC News: New bill seeks to protect abortion patients by limiting access to data
5. The Guardian: Googling abortion? Your details aren’t as private as you think
6. The Washington Post: Google promised to delete sensitive data. It logged my abortion clinic visit.

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