Simp Apps Review
What is Simp? What data does it track?
If you haven’t heard of this app yet, here’s what you should know.Simp uses millennial slang to market to a younger audience as “an app that will inspire your friends and be their biggest supporter”. It’s promoted as a social media-style app where you can find out who likes you. Promoted through TikTok and other social media platforms, it’s easy to see how the app has gained such a large following. However, it has recently raised privacy concerns.
Why? Simply by looking in the app store, you can view the personal privacy violations you agreed to when you downloaded the app.Simp not only tracks your location, but also collects your contacts, identifiers, diagnostic information, contact information, user content, usage data, and more.
Spurred on by the recent concerns surrounding Simp, I decided to do more research. By researching the app and its policies, we found more and more questions. We were able to determine that the Simp address listed in the privacy policy is not the company’s headquarters, but rather a mail forwarding center, making it difficult to determine who is responsible for collecting your information and therefore how it is handled.
What should you do if your child has downloaded Simp?
After reading this information, you may be concerned. The best thing you can do is talk to your child about the app and why these privacy issues are concerning. If your child has downloaded the app, make sure they delete their account and remove the app from the phone to minimize the information provided to the app.
How can you protect yourself and your family from downloading intrusive apps in the future?
In the future, make sure you check the privacy policy of an app before you download it. The easiest way to do this is to find the app in the app store and scroll down to the bottom of the page. Look for the section labeled “App Privacy” and identify the data the app collects (at least for Apple devices). Use this information to assess whether the downloaded app is safe. If it’s not, look for alternatives to the app. No matter how much you want or think you need the app, it’s not worth risking your personal information.