Wysa

Wysa

Touchkin
Wi-Fi

Review date: April 25, 2023

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Mozilla says

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People voted: A little creepy

Wysa describes itself as "an emotionally intelligent chatbot that uses AI to react to the emotions you express." Launched in 2016 by founder Jo Aggarwal, who discovered bots were easier to talk to when dealing with her own depression, the app says it offers "a mood tracker, mindfulness coach, anxiety helper, and mood-boosting buddy, all rolled into one." Along with Wysa's AI chatbot, the app also offers in-app text-based chat sessions with real, live therapists. Wysa offers some free access to their AI chatbot. To access more features, users can choose between two subscription options, a lower cost option with access to the tools, or a higher cost option for access to the tools and coaches. So, how does Wysa's privacy look? We're happy to say, Wysa's privacy looks pretty dang good! They seem to be one of the rare mental health apps that isn't looking to make money off your personal information. Good work Wysa!

What could happen if something goes wrong?

First reviewed April 20, 2022. Review updated, April 25, 2023

Good news! One year later and Wysa is still really good at privacy! Wysa still doesn't track users for advertising, collect lots of personal information for targeted advertising purposes, share or sell lots of data with third parties, or generally be an awful company who doesn't respect privacy. Good work Wysa! Keep being a leader on privacy for all to see! Lord knows, we need many more companies like Wysa out there.

Oh, one more thing we love about Wysa. They have one of the best privacy policies we've ever read. Lots of clear, useful information, and a nice tracking of when they've made updates to the policy and what has changed. When we ask companies to write better privacy policies, this is one we hope they will look to for guidance.

Read our 2022 review:

There are so many bad-for-your-privacy mental health apps out there in the world it is depressing. Thank goodness Wysa doesn't seem to be one of them! They don't require any personal identifiers to use their service. They don't request your personal data. They don't share your personal data. They don't sell it either. What?!? It's so refreshing to see a mental health app with strong privacy practices. Good on you Wysa.

Wysa does say that no direct marketing is performed but that they may use social media or other marketing, but no personal data is shared for this purpose. Again, that is very good. Consumer Reports did find in 2021 that Wysa shared some data with Facebook, but from what we can tell, that is likely not personal information. And all those AI chatbot conversations, Wysa says they will never share that data without user consent.

Wysa says they can share aggregated, de-identified data for analytics and to help improve their AI. We're not too worried about this with Wysa as they say they don't process geolocation at a level that makes your data identifiable but we also feel compelled to mention it has been found to be relatively easy to de-identify such user data where location data is more precise.

All in all, Wysa seems to be a breath of fresh air in the mental health app space. It actually take steps to implement privacy and security by design and default. We absolutely love that here at *Privacy Not Included. Thank you Wysa and please, keep up the good work!

Tips to protect yourself

For extra security, you can use the app without registering. You can also use a fake name.

The app providers give the following security tips:

  • Always lock your mobile screen by setting a password. Use strong passwords and keep passwords private. Never leave your device unattended.
  • Always extend your mobile screen password to set an App PIN to keep your conversations with the App private.
  • Always keep your mobile operating system up-to-date.
  • Enable remote access of your devices to enable you to locate and control your devices remotely in the event your device gets stolen.
  • Install anti-virus software to protect against virus attacks and infections
  • Avoid phishing emails. Do not open files, click on links or download programs from an unknown source.
  • Be wise about using Wi-Fi. Before you send personal and sensitive data over your laptop or mobile device on a public wireless network in a coffee shop, library, airport, hotel, or other public place, see if your data will be protected.
  • mobile

Can it snoop on me? information

Camera

Device: N/A

App: No

Microphone

Device: N/A

App: Yes

Tracks location

Device: N/A

App: No

What can be used to sign up?

What data does the company collect?

How does the company use this data?

"Wysa does not request Your Personal Data. If You inadvertently submit any Personal Identifiable Information (including but not limited to email identifier, location address, mobile numbers) via text messages, then we will process it with your data basis this agreement and will irreversibly redact any Personal Identifiable Information within 24 hours in our system. Please do not share any personal data that directly or indirectly identifies you at any time during your use of our service such as while in conversation with Wysa's AI Coach or with a Wysa Emotional Well-being Professional. All conversations with Wysa's AI Coach and Wysa Emotional Well-being Professional are private and not shared with anyone. If you use Wysa within our partner ecosystem, then anonymized and summarized information is exchanged, but ONLY with the intent of enhancing your experience. The details of your conversations are never shared with any external parties outside Wysa, including any partners."

"The Wysa team occasionally uses some messages, which are anonymous, to train Wysa's AI to help improve its ability to have conversations. Any identity specific data is removed, so no-one can ever know who said what. Also, no-one outside of Wysa will ever have access to chat messages without your explicit consent."

How can you control your data?

"You have the Right to be Forgotten. You can at any point of time, delete all your provided data by using the “reset my data” feature available in the Wysa App settings. Post reset, all your provided data will be deleted from our servers and cannot be recovered."

"Any personal identifiers, entered in english and shared in your conversation with AI Coach will get irreversibly redacted within 24 hours within our system.

We may retain one copy of your data even after your subscription ends or Institution contract ends if it is reasonably necessary.

This could be in the following situations:

to comply with applicable applicable legal and statutory requirements;

at the request of a returning subscriber;

to respond to your requests

based on contractual obligations with your Institution;

to fulfill processing that is in our legitimate interest.

Where not specified we retain your data for a maximum of 10 years since the last update and as per our internal information retention policies.

Your emergency contact information, if any provided, will be deleted after fifteen (15) days at the end of the subscription. If you renew the subscription within those fifteen (15) days, the emergency contact information will not be deleted.

You can also, at any point of time, delete all your conversation data and any emergency contact information provided by using the “reset my data” feature available in the App settings. Refer here in our policy for more details."

What is the company’s known track record of protecting users’ data?

Average

No known privacy or security incidents discovered in the last 3 years.

Child Privacy Information

"The App is intended for a general audience and is not directed to or intended to be used by children under the age of thirteen years.

There is a special necessity to protect children's privacy on the App. We do not knowingly collect any personal data from children.

Write to us if you think we have collected any personal data of your child. We will respond to you within one calendar month from verification. We may at times be unable to address your request, if we are unable to correctly identify the user. We will deactivate the child’s account, if we find we have been collecting personal data from your child. Upon identification we will take reasonable measures to promptly delete such personal data from our records.

We encourage parents and legal guardians to monitor their children’s Internet usage. To help enforce our Privacy Policy by instructing their children to not provide any personal data without their permission. Do not share your credit/debit card or other payment instrument with your child to make any in-app purchase. "

Can this product be used offline?

No

User-friendly privacy information?

Yes

Detailed privacy policy with definitions, and privacy FAQ are offered by Wysa

Links to privacy information

Does this product meet our Minimum Security Standards? information

Yes

Encryption

Yes

Wysa use TLS and SSL encryption during transfer and AES-256 protocol at rest.

Strong password

Yes

Security updates

Yes

Manages vulnerabilities

Yes

Privacy policy

Yes

Does the product use AI? information

Yes

According to Wysa, "Wysa AI Coach is an artificial intelligence-based 'emotionally intelligent' service which responds to the emotions you express and uses evidence-based cognitive-behavioral techniques (CBT), DBT, meditation, breathing, yoga, motivational interviewing and micro-actions to help you build mental resilience skills and feel better."

The AI Coach will always check if it has understood you incorrectly before progressing.

Is this AI untrustworthy?

Can’t Determine

What kind of decisions does the AI make about you or for you?

Wysa decides what kind of help/content to provide you.

Is the company transparent about how the AI works?

Yes

Wysa provides an extensive product FAQ.

Does the user have control over the AI features?

Can’t Determine

*Privacy Not Included

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