Google will start auto-deleting abortion clinic visits from user location history

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

In the coming weeks, we will be able to remove visits to abortion clinics, domestic violence shelters, weight loss clinics, and other sensitive locations from our location histories. The deletion will happen soon after the visit after the company's systems have identified that a trip was taken to one of the locations. In the wake of the Supreme Court's decision to overturn abortion rights, several states have made moves to outlaw the procedure.

You can turn off location logging completely by following the instructions on the website.

There is an update coming for Fitbit that will allow you to remove multiple menstruation logs at the same time if you use the health tracking feature.

The updates are meant to remove data from the server that could be used to prosecute people for seeking care, but the company still has a lot of other data about you. Search and YouTube histories could be used as evidence in an investigation. We want to know if other steps are being taken to protect user data.

The company reiterates that it will oppose demands that are overly broad or otherwise objectionable. Unless there is a pressing security concern, users will be notified when they give their data to the government.

Official medical records aren't as private as we think, and everything from text messages and purchase records could be used against you in court. The company isn't the only one keeping an eye on your phone. The privacy risks that people seeking care may now face can be found in our article.