Millions of people around the world use fitness apps to track their progress and activity. Such applications typically claim to make people follow a healthier lifestyle as they are usually designed to help you reach your fitness goals and also encourage you to stick to those targets. Nowadays, an increasing amount of people are caring about their health and how they are supporting their bodies overall. Whether that is looking into clean beauty and wellness or taking their fitness regime more seriously, they want to be the best versions of themselves. However, the question on many people’s lips is – are fitness apps really safe? Having said that, there are several basic steps you can take to protect yourself.
How Secure Is Your Health or Fitness App?
Health and fitness apps are all about tracking your steps and other physical activities, such as monitoring your sleep and logging your food intake. While these apps can help you improve your overall health, they can potentially put your sensitive data at risk. Use reputable apps, adhere to other safety procedures, and secure your contacts, images, videos, and sensitive health information. It’s quite normal to be desperate to track your fitness level since you might be typically investing a lot of time and effort while experimenting with several things like calf sleeves that could be perfect for your fitness journey. However, it’s essential that you download a reliable application that doesn’t steal your data when you track your progress through them.
The fitness world is a big business. Global Industry Analysts expects the industry research firm to reach $38 billion this year, and that number is only going up. Mobile Fitness Market Intelligence pegged the number of apps used to monitor fitness at 54 million in 2017, and that figure is expected to rise to over 130 million by 2020.
Is the health app safe to use?
That’s the biggest question most people ask when downloading a health application from the app store. After all, a lot of apps provide medical advice and instructions, so it’s important to know if it is safe. Luckily, we have tested dozens of fitness apps, and we’ve uncovered a few common red flags to watch out for.
Health apps are beneficial to all smartphone users, even those who don’t have a health-related issue. They can help people track their fitness better, provide easy access to health resources, and even provide some much-needed stress relief. However, if you are using alternative medication such as cannabis (say, these Cake brand delta-8 products or others) for chronic pain, nausea, or any other health conditions you may have, you may not be able to input that into the fitness apps that you use. Aside from that, you can use it for pretty much everything. Though it’s true that not all health apps are safe to use, some apps claim to help you lose weight, some patch you up to improve your health, and some claim to heal you.
Should I use a workout app?
A workout app is a convenient way to track how diligently you exercise. Our phones now do almost everything for us, and workouts are no exception.
Workout apps provide a convenient way to track your fitness goals, whether working out at the gym or home. They work as calendars, recording your exercise sessions, your calorie intake, and graphs of your progress over time. Some apps are even known to offer workout schedules and supplement reviews (like the Bio Complete 3 review) on your current fitness level and goals.
Fitness apps have become a way of life for many as they strive to get into shape. These applications streamline and personalize their workouts-making them easier than ever before. However, these apps have gained popularity so quickly and have become so prevalent that it is almost impossible to find the one that is right for you.
The apps we use every day can be a huge source of security vulnerabilities, and their data is immensely valuable. According to cyber security company Carbon Black, Strava and Nike faced serious data breaches in 2018, which exposed more than 300 million and 50 million user records, respectively. Buffer, a popular social media sharing tool, experienced a similar hack in 2015.
The hackers could access sensitive user data, including email addresses, first and last names, and avatars. The attackers had also gained unauthorized access to the email accounts of a lot of users, which allowed them to send malicious emails to 11 million users, including celebrities like Jennifer Lawrence and Owen Wilson. In 2016, Facebook suffered a data breach that exposed over 50 million accounts, and they began notifying affected users in early September 2017.
Fitness apps are great tools for staying motivated and keeping you on track. But they also pose a significant security risk. When these apps collect too much information about you, there’s the risk of identity theft, financial theft, or worse. This is why it’s important to stay vigilant when downloading and using such types of apps.