Q Toon: All Your Data Are Belong to Us

While Facebook has been getting a lot of attention from Congress and the mainstream media this week, Grindr has also had to hastily explain to its customers that its same-sex dating app has shared users' HIV statuses (stati?), with two outside analytics firms.

Further analysis also revealed that Grindr is sharing users’ precise GPS position, sexuality, relationship status, ethnicity, and phone ID to other third-party advertising companies. This information – which didn’t include HIV status data – was sometimes being shared in a ‘plain text’ format, which meant it could be easily hacked.

Anyone who uses a computer hooked up to the internet has seen their privacy eroded bit by megabit over the years. Those cookies piling up unseen in the bowels of our computers are, we are told, essential components of our on-line existence. But they result in experiences such as this: I was looking for some sheet music on-line last week, and ever since, the advertising on gocomics.com has been nothing but sheet music.

You no doubt have had the same experience. Well after you bought that clothes dryer at Best Buy, every dot.com Dick and Harry seems to be trying to sell you another one.

Facebook took that business even further, enabling Big Brothr.com to glean everything knowable about you because some idle friend of yours on Facebook answered a questionnaire to find out which H.R. Puff'n'stuff character he is, or decided to prove that, why yes, she could indeed think of a word that contains a vowel, so there!

Then, through no fault of your own, your news feed becomes rife with stories about Hillary Clinton wanting to confiscate everyone's clothes dryers.

Now, as for the Grindr breach, the company assures its LGBTQ users that their data was shared responsibly, and that they're in no danger of it (them?) getting out to potential employers, TMZ or Vice President Pence.

Still, [chief security officer Bryce] Case defended Grindr's decision to share the data, arguing that Apptimize and Localytics are simply tools to help apps like Grindr function better, and that the information was not shared to make money or for other nefarious purposes.
Case stressed that the HIV data had only been shared with Apptimize as part of Grindr's standard rollout procedure for new features on the app. In this case, it was part of a new opt-in feature that would allow users to be reminded to get tested for HIV. The company stopped sharing the information with the third party when the feature was rolled out last week, Case said.

Whether or not Grindr's users begin to shy away from the company's outreach efforts, this episode demonstrates the need to update the 22-year-old rules for patient privacy observed by every hospital, doctor, and insurance company in the country.

Grindr data breach is a wake-up call for policymakers to revisit and revise privacy regulations, specifically the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA). Since 1996, HIPAA has governed the patient privacy and protection of private medical information. Back then, policymakers did not foresee situations in which sensitive medical data is shared with a platform that is not involved in medical care. Therefore HIPAA only covers medical providers and their business associates and does not pertain to platforms such as Grindr. Had a similar breach happened at a hospital, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) would immediately start a thorough investigation, fine the hospital, and ensure that adequate policies are in place to prevent breaches in future.

Under the Corrupt Trump Administration, I doubt that any investigation into Grindr's data breach would not be focused on protecting user's privacy but in shutting the app down, or at least ferreting out gay, bi and trans soldiers in the armed forces. And I shudder to imagine what the congressional hearings would be like.

Q Toon: Rio Grindr

Although none of them represent the United States, there have been a record number of out LGBT athletes at the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janiero — 49 by Cyd Ziegler's count on Outsports. I've seen some complaints that these athletes aren't getting American media attention, even when they've celebrated finishing an event by proposing to their significant others; the American media's concentration on American athletes accounts for some of this.

Enter, on the other hand, Daily Beast London editor Nico Hines, a straight reporter who posted a profile on the gay hook-up app Grindr to see what athletes were looking for gay sex in Rio. Hines then posted an exposé on the site, headlined  "I Got Three Grindr Dates in an Hour in the Olympic Village."

What the straight guy didn't realize was what a terrible idea it was to publicly share key identifiers that would help people identify who these athletes were and possibly lead to a mass outing. It would be bad enough if they were all divers from Western Europe. But Hines didn't stop there, admitting in the piece that at least one was from a homophobic country. And he didn't stop there, he even identified the sport the athlete was in!

The consequences for that athlete could easily exceed embarrassment. Several countries in Africa, the Caribbean, and Islam actively persecute LGBT citizens and visitors. Worse, in some of these countries, there is no legal consequence for murdering a gay or lesbian family member.

Hines himself acknowledged in the article that some athletes remain closeted in their "notoriously homophobic" home countries. To its credit, The Daily Beast made an effort after receiving complaints to scrub identifying details from the article, then removed it entirely and sent Hines home to his wife and children.

Q Toon: These Are Not the Dudes You're Looking For

Around this point in the month of December, I'll often turn to the movies for cartooning inspiration. Sure, Christmas is ten days off and all the cartoonists are drawing Santas and reindeer and frantic holiday shoppers; but some of my editors have a looming deadline for their January issue and are hoping for something else.

December can be a slow news period politically (not so much this year, but then, the presidential candidates don't happen to be obsessing about teh gays at the moment). So, for the second week in a row, Bergetoons goes to the movies -- albeit one more current than last week.

Whenever there's a big blockbuster out, someone somewhere is on the lookout to find whether there are any LGBT characters in it. If so, how are they portrayed? If there aren't any, why not? Should we be offended? Or do we have a grand marshal for next year's pride parade?

Everyone is being pretty tight-lipped about the current episode, so I have no idea whether, say, Captain Phasma will turn out to B L or T. The Star Wars universe apparently does have some gays and lesbians in the literature, if not necessarily the films.

But consider the odds. Among those thousands of storm troopers, it only makes sense that some of them bat for my team.

QToon: Tell Me All Your Secrets

I normally put these up on Wednesday, but I've been having computer issues at home.

I've been trying to figure out why "job providers" now need applicants to reveal their Facebook passwords.

They already had the ability (and the right) to visit your Facebook page and find out whether you Like lolcats or George Takei's jokes; whether your Farmville is overgrown with weeds or you've slaughtered entire neighborhoods in Mob Wars; and whether you've shared posts from 350.org, Tea Patriots, or TMZ. If all they wanted to do was check out how many photos you've posted of yourself stumbling down drunk in a bar or bleary-eyed in an Amsterdam hashish den, they could simply demand that you "friend" them.

But your password? Given that for the typical job applicant, applying for jobs is itself a full-time job, that's a lot of companies who would be able to pose as you and elicit opinions about you from your Aunt Brenda, the ex-boyfriend who still thinks you're coming back to him someday, that girl from study hall in high school, or that guy who thought you were the sax player in a jazz ensemble he was in back in 1973 but when he found out you weren't he kept you on as a friend anyway because you share a casual interest in "The Mentalist."  

What are employers going to demand next? The PIN to your bank account? The keys to your house?

Q Toon: Who Needs Gaydar Any More?

Leaving aside the serious topics of gays in the military, marriage equality, and non-discrimination in the workplace, this week's cartoon turns to the latest technological fad in the gay community.

Grindr uses the GPS function of your wireless handheld communications unit to track where you are; you can use it to check out anyone else with Grindr who happens to be nearby, and perhaps message whoever strikes your fancy. The other guys with Grindr on their phones are sorted for you according to their distance from you, so you can send messages to the cute guy who is across the room, across the street, or across town; and Grindr will display any messages from horny gay guys you passed since the last time you checked in. For an extra fee, Grindr will alert you to each incoming message as it arrives.

So I hear tell. I'm well spoken for, so I have no need to hunt for gay hookups on my phone. Heck, I have so far resisted the urge to have a phone with me at all times, which practically makes me a Luddite.

Here's how their web site advertises the service:

"Meet Guys Near You With Grindr
"Meet guys at home or on the road for free with Grindr for iPhone or iPod touch. Start chatting with local guys in seconds!
"The go-to place for gay, bi, and curious guys to meet, the location-based Grindr is free, fast, and fun. It uses GPS technology in your iPhone or BlackBerry and Wi-Fi in your iPod touch or iPad to determine your exact location and instantly connect you with guys in your area. Simply launch Grindr to see local guys (the closest appear first) and view pictures, stats, and map locations at a tap. It’s that easy. So come on, see who’s available on Grindr."

So it's a hook-up site -- the hottest thing since Chat Roulette (which is SO last February!). You might be able to locate a gay lawyer or plumber, but it's probably not the easiest way to find someone to draw up your power of attorney or fix your kitchen sink. If you're expecting to find a new free porn site, though, you'll be disappointed. Grindr rules require users to keep their profile pictures PG-13.

Two reporters for the Washington Examiner thought it would be newsworthy to find out how many Grindr customers they would find in the halls of the Senate and House, in the White House press room, and in the parking lot of the Pentagon. I'm not sure what they meant to prove, since there are usually plenty of tourists as well as government employees and lobbyists in and around government buildings -- and the reporters didn't record themselves trying to initiate any chat sessions. At the Pentagon, they may have been trying to suggest a quick way to purge the military of gay personnel while Don't Ask, Don't Tell is still in effect.

So you active service personnel might just want to ignore the incoming chat message from this fellow: