A San Francisco Jury found on Friday that Meta had eavesdropped on the users of a popular period-tracking app, Flo. 

The lawsuit, was filed in 2021 by eight women against Flo and a group of other tech companies including Google and Facebook, now known as Meta. The app asked users about their sex lives, mental health and diets before guiding them through menstruation and pregnancy. The women, who based their claims on a 2019 Wall Street Journal story and a 2021 FTC investigation, allege that Flo then shared some of that data with the tech giants, SFGATE reports.

Google, Flo, and analytics company Flurry all settled with the plaintiffs, however Meta fought through the entire trial and lost. 

The case against Meta focused on its Facebook software development kit, which Flo added to its app and which is generally used for analytics and advertising services. The women alleged that between June 2016 and February 2019, Flo sent Facebook, through that kit, various records of “Custom App Events” — such as a user clicking a particular button in the “wanting to get pregnant” section of the app.

Their complaint also pointed to Facebook’s terms for its business tools, which said the company used so-called “event data” to personalize ads and content.

In a 2022 filing, the tech giant admitted that Flo used Facebook’s kit during this period and that the app sent data connected to “App Events.” But Meta denied receiving intimate information about users’ health. -SFGate

The jury didn't buy Meta's argument - ruling against them in a unanimous decision, and finding that Flo's users had a reasonable expectation that they weren't being overheard or recorded, and found that Meta did not have consent to eavesdrop or record. The company was found to have violated California's Invasion of Privacy Act.

According to a June filing about the case's class-action status, over 3.7 million women in the United States registered for Flo between November 2016 and February 2019 - with potential claimants expected to be notified via email and on a case website. 

Meta told SFGATE that the company "vigorously" disagrees with the verdict, and is "exploring all legal options."

"The plaintiffs’ claims against Meta are simply false," said company spokesman Chris Sgro. "User privacy is important to Meta, which is why we do not want health or other sensitive information and why our terms prohibit developers from sending any."

The plaintiffs, of course, celebrated - with their attorneys Michael Canty and Carol Villegas telling the outlet that the "verdict is a wake-up call to companies that view consent as a formality and transparency as optional."

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