Reproductive Rights and Digital Rights: EFF’s 2024 Review

Daly Barnett’s year-end article for the Electronic Frontier Foundation connects reproductive freedom to the infrastructure of digital surveillance. Its concrete subjects include the location-data service Locate X, automated licence-plate readers and EFF’s security work with reproductive-rights organizations. It is an account of advocacy in 2024, rather than a universal guide to abortion law or personal digital safety.

Following information beyond the clinic

The article shifts attention from medical records to information generated elsewhere. Data about movement can acquire a new significance when institutions use it to infer where someone went or whom they visited. A feminist analysis therefore needs to examine the organizations that collect, sell, request and exchange information, as well as the initial act of collection.

An important question is what a protection covers. A rule about one database may leave another transfer untouched; a limit on collection may differ from a limit on later use. These distinctions help explain why a reassuring privacy statement should be assessed against actual information flows and institutional responsibilities.

Privacy as a collective condition

The costs of surveillance do not end with the person whose information is disclosed. Concern about exposure can affect relationships among patients, providers and support networks. Privacy can therefore be understood as a condition for collective action and access to care, alongside its role as an individual interest.

Barnett’s focus on advocacy and organizational support also offers a way to avoid placing the entire burden on individuals. Readers can ask who controls retention, who approves disclosure, and what consequences follow a prohibited transfer. Those questions locate responsibility where decisions are made.

Because this is a dated review, its descriptions of investigations and policy disputes should be read in their 2024 context. Its continuing analytical value is the connection between bodily autonomy and data governance: control over a body can also be exercised through decisions about information outside a medical setting.