The Ethics of Using Legally-Obtained Personal Data in Reporting

'The Pillar, a Substack dedicated to Catholic news, used a mysterious data set to identify a high ranking Catholic priest — a monsignor. From there, they outed the priest as a user of the hook-up app Grindr. Next they plotted out his movements — from his home, to work, to gay bars and private residences. It was all made possible by data that Grindr itself collected: data subsequently made available for (legal) purchase by a data broker, which somehow got into Pillar’s hands. The priest resigned from his post at the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops the day the story broke. In this interview, On the Media guest host Brandy Zadrozny talks with Sara Morrison, a data and privacy reporter at Recode at Vox, about how this data came up for sale, and the ethical implications of using it.'