Overview

• Cambridge’s Minderoo Centre report finds top menstrual apps sell detailed personal data—including health, diet, contraception and sexual preferences—to advertisers and third parties.
• Pregnancy data is valued over 200 times more than basic demographics, driving firms to target users with personalized marketing and prompting shifts in consumer behavior.
• Experts warn misused cycle data could fuel health insurance discrimination, workplace surveillance, cyberstalking and legal actions in abortion cases.
• UK and EU regulations classify period data as special category with stronger protections than in the US, where it remains regulated as general wellness information.
• Researchers call on public health bodies like the NHS and Planned Parenthood to develop transparent, privacy-focused period apps that grant users control over data use.