alt Hacker News"... wrongful death lawsuits are typically the only way to hold these companies accountable. Yet, there are very few people who have not agreed Abbott's toxic terms of their proprietary companion application ..."
I (a non-diabetic interested in athletic performance) use an Abbott CGM sporadically and I have absolutely not agreed to any terms of service nor any other agreement of any kind - legal or otherwise.
I bought a purpose-specific, old model iphone from "Back Market" with no SIM card, very briefly allowed it wifi access long enough to download the "Lingo" app, then set the phone to airplane mode. Dedicated, throwaway email and AppleID.
It has never left airplane mode and it works perfectly. Pairing subsequent sensors does not require taking it out of airplane mode.
Further, I have no legal relationship nor have I made any agreement of any kind with Abbott.
I highly recommend that any user of these devices do the same.
Replies
> I bought a purpose-specific, old model iphone from "Back Market" with no SIM card, very briefly allowed it wifi access long enough to download the "Lingo" app, then set the phone to airplane mode. Dedicated, throwaway email and AppleID.
None of this actually matters if you went through the steps to use the app. The app is designed such that you agree to the terms before you can use it.
You can use all the throwaway emails, devices, VPNs, and other tricks in the world, but unless you can reliably demonstrate to a court that you were utilizing the app in a way that didn’t involve accepting any terms of service then they could simply demonstrate that it’s part of their app flow.
Even using tricks to utilize the device outside of the app wouldn’t help, because they could simply demonstrate that you weren’t using it as designed or intended.
If you ticked the agree-to-TOS box (even if anonymously and offline) then you still "agreed" to the TOS. At least in a legal sense.
I think you might be conflating some things.
This is such a bizarre gotcha in a world of rapidly decreasing technical and civil rights. I'm still waiting for someone here to pop out of the gallery during one of these trials going "well, akshually...", and turning everything around. Doesn't seem to be moving the needle, as it were.
> I highly recommend that any user of these devices do the same.
No thank you. I have to wear these devices 24/7 to keep me alive, and it was a huge quality of life improvement when I was able to control them all from my phone. I see literally no benefit to doing what you suggest.
In most cases you can’t use the device without agreeing to the terms of service right?
For example a service I use a lot recently changed their terms of service - there was no way to keep using the service without agreeing.
Might be different for devices or services that don’t need internet to function; but even for those you have some “activation” step nowadays that forces you to agree before “unlocking”