Airthings ASA releases a new app that forces always online and collected user devices data to be sent to their cloud

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On May 21, 2024, Airthings ASA sent an e-mail to all users stating their old app, now renamed to "Wave Gen 1", but previously "Airthings" will be retired, and asks users to use their new Airthings app instead, ensuring it will contain more features.

Unfortunately, their new app does not allow users to use their devices in offline mode like the previous version, and all data is automatically sent to Airthings servers without warning.

Their previous app was last updated on May 29, 2024, to reflect the name change.

Background

Airthings sells devices that and monitor users' rooms' air quality and collects data about it. The Gen 1 devices have Bluetooth BLE capability that allow users to view a graph of all the devices' sensors (like CO2, humidity, and Radon) and assign a room name like "kid's bedroom", "living room", "bathroom", etc. to distinguish between various devices.

Users first had to log in to set up their account, but once they logged in for the first time, they were able to view their device's collected data in real time even if they had no internet connection, thanks to the devices using Bluetooth BLE.

[Incident]

The old Airthings app had the ability to view user data even if the phone was offline. The app connects to all devices and displays their status and data. A dark pattern "sync" button would both collect data from the devices using BLE and send data to the cloud. By going offline, this could be prevented. Users would often use an offline secondary phone as the household monitor.

On May 21, 2024, Airthings ASA alerted old app users by e-mail that their current app will not be publicly available in the future and that they should move to the new app that does not allow collecting device data without being online as it uploads it at the same time to their servers before displaying it.

Airthings' response

When asked about offline features, support agents seemed ignorant or feigned ignorance that the Wave Gen 1 app allowed offline use of their device.

Consumer response

https://www.reddit.com/r/airthings/comments/1ca1qxu/airthings_will_no_longer_sync_to_wave_plus_wo/

https://www.reddit.com/r/airthings/comments/1i7bf5x/when_did_login_become_a_requirement/