Warnung: *Datenschutz ist in diesem Produkt nicht inbegriffen
Shine was built by two women of color to focus on groups too often underrepresented in wellness conversations -- women of color. The app features daily meditations, self-care courses, personalized support, and monthly virtual workshops. With a majority of teachers being people of color, Shine is able to focus more specifically on the causes of stress, anxiety, and depression in the Black, Indigenous, and people of color communities, especially among women. Meditation topics focused on specific communities -- AAPI, Black, LGBTQ+, Latinx for example -- are designed to help users manage work frustrations, navigate relationships, and find joy. With a staff that is 80% BIPOC, Shine believes that fighting for the mental health of marginalized people helps fights for their lives and rights too. Yay for caring for and about marginalized communities! But how does Shine's privacy and security practices look? Well, unfortunately, in 2022 they didn't really shine. And then they got sold to Headspace, and their privacy practices don't really shine either.
Was könnte passieren, wenn etwas schiefgeht?
First reviewed April 20, 2022. Review updated, April 25, 2023
The Shine app no longer exists. This is because Shine was acquired by Headspace Health in September, 2022. As of April 25, 2023, this app is no longer available for download in either the Google or Apple app stores. Also, their privacy policy no longer exists. According to the announcement, the plan was for the Shine app to be integrated into Headspace Health. So, it seems users of Shine got pushed over to Headspace. If you'd like to read our review of Headspace's privacy, you can find it here. Spoiler: We found Headspace's privacy practices have gotten worse since our review in 2022 and now earns our *Privacy Not Included warning label. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news.
Read our 2022 review:
Shine's privacy policy is rather hard to decipher at times (honestly, all privacy policies kinda are, but Shine's made our brain hurt just a little bit more). They lead off their privacy policy with what they call the company's privacy assurances. This includes statements like, "We do not sell your Personal Information to any nonaffiliated third parties." and "We do not share your Personal Information with nonaffiliated third parties that would use it to contact you about their own products and services, unless you have allowed us to do so and as permitted pursuant to a joint marketing agreement." But what do those statements actually mean? Does that mean that they could sell data to any affiliated third parties. Yes, it seems so. Does it mean they may share personal data with marketing and advertising providers. Again, yes it does. And what does you giving them permission pursuant of a joint marketing agreement etc etc. actually look like? It's rather confusing legalese that doesn't make us feel great about their overall privacy practices.
Shine says they can collect a fair amount of personal information on you including first and last name, postal address, email address, and other "identifying information that you choose." They can also collect information such as your annual revenue, gender, and certain demographic information they say they don't consider personal info but rather anonymized statistical data. Shine also says they can receive information about your from third parties including business partners, data brokers, or credit reporting agencies. So much data from so many places! We don't like it.
What does Shine do with all that data they collect? Well, quite a bit of promoting, advertising, marketing, market research and even "to provide you with information about third parties that may be of interest to you" according to their privacy policy. They say they can share your personal information with a whole host of people including marketing or advertising providers, professional advisors, and even Rakuten Advertising, an ad company that can collect their own personal information on you when you interact with Shine. So much data sharing! Again, we don't like it.
They go on to say, as so many mental health app companies we reviewed do, "We may disclose aggregated, anonymized, statistical data and/or non-identifying information about our Users without restriction." And here is where we must remind you that it has been found to be relatively easy to de-anonymize this data.
Shine collects a lot of personal information, shares a lot of personal information with a lot of people and on top of all that, they don't meet our Minimum Security Standards (we were able to log into the app with the weak password "111111". ) All in all, Shine leaves us concerned about their privacy and security practices. Which is a bummer, because we here at *Privacy Not Included firmly believe protecting the privacy of marginalized communities is very important. Here's hoping Shine will step up and do better for the communities they work to help.
Tipps zu Ihrem Schutz
- Do not log in using third-party accounts like Facebook - Do not give consent for sharing of personal data for marketing and advertisement.
- Chose a strong password! You may use a password control tool like 1Password, KeePass etc
- Do not use social media plug-ins.
- Use your device privacy controls to limit access to your personal information via app (do not give access to your camera, microphone, images, location unless neccessary) - Keep your app regularly updated
- Limit ad tracking via your device (eg on iPhone go to Privacy -> Advertising -> Limit ad tracking) and biggest ad networks (for Google, go to Google account and turn off ad personalization)
- Request your data be deleted once you stop using the app. Simply deleting an app from your device usually does not erase your personal data.
- When starting a sign-up, do not agree to tracking of your data if possible.
Kann es mich ausspionieren?
Kamera
Gerät: Nicht verfügbar
App: Nein
Mikrofon
Gerät: Nicht verfügbar
App: Nein
Verfolgt den Standort
Gerät: Nicht verfügbar
App: Nein
Was kann zur Registrierung verwendet werden?
E-Mail-Adresse
Ja
Telefonnummer
Nein
Drittanbieter-Konto
Ja
Facebook or Apple accounts can be used
Welche Daten sammelt das Unternehmen?
Persönliche
First and last name, postal address, email address
Körperbezogen
Soziale
Wie nutzt das Unternehmen die Daten?
Wie können Sie Ihre Daten kontrollieren?
Wie ist das Unternehmen in der Vergangenheit mit den Daten über seine Verbraucher umgegangen?
No known privacy or security incidents discovered in the last 3 years.
Informationen zum Datenschutz bei Kindern
Kann dieses Produkt offline genutzt werden?
You can download your Shine meditations
Benutzerfreundliche Informationen zum Datenschutz?
Links zu Datenschutzinformationen
Erfüllt dieses Produkt unsere Mindestsicherheitsstandards?
Verschlüsselung
All information you provide to us through the Websites is secured by TLS technology, and is stored on our secure, password protected servers behind firewalls.
Sicheres Passwort
Improved their password requirement.
Sicherheits-Updates
Umgang mit Schwachstellen
Datenschutzrichtlinie
Tauchen Sie tiefer ein
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Headspace Health Announces Agreement to Acquire The Shine App, an Inclusive Mental Health and Wellbeing PlatformBusiness Wire
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Mental health apps have terrible privacy protections, report findsThe Verge
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'Creepy' Mental Health And Prayer Apps Are Sharing Your Personal DataForbes
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Mental health and prayer apps have some of the worst privacy protections, study claims, finding they 'track, share and capitalize' on users intimate thoughts and feelingsDaily Mail
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This Wellness App Shines a Light on Black Mental HealthPCMag
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Top 10 Free Mental Health Apps in 2022Psych Central
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Most Meditation Apps Are Voiced by White People, but the Founders of ‘Shine’ Are Changing ThatPure Wow
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Shine brings its female-focused self-care app to AndroidTechCrunch
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Meet the Women Founders Behind Shine and Wysa, Two Apps Focused on Mental Health and Self-CareYahoo!
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The Best Meditation Apps to Help With AnxietyOprah Daily
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Shine App Founders Give a Master Class in MindfulnessPsych Central
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The Best Mental-Health Apps for POC, According to ExpertsThe Strategist
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