Oh boy...this topic came up a month ago and didn't end well. In short, no there is no app and there probably won't be. It's advised to leave it at that.
A similar thread was posted a few weeks before the one Data mentions, and can be found here. Chips answer in that thread (probably) still stands. If not, I'm sure I'll be corrected by a staff member.
I don't know where Data got the idea that there probably wouldn't be an app, because as I said in the above thread, there isn't one currently, but the board and admin team are aware that an increasing portion of EC's members view the site on mobile devices. So yes, it's something we're very interested in, but it likely won't happen until after we've done the major upgrade to new forum software (which is being worked on, but is sort of back-burner at the moment.)
I got the impression from the other threads that even though it is on the list of things to do, it isn't near the top. It sounded like it was on the backburner because of the legal issues involved and the programming aspect of it. The other mods got kind of upset with Person57 when he suggested the app in one of his threads. It was most likely because he went to Amazon by himself, but I got the feeling it wasn't coming out anytime soon.
You pretty much nailed it with the bolded bit. The reason wasn't because we wanted to give the impression it was a low priority, but because it's an issue that also needs security considerations when it is being developed. As a result, we had to be very direct when person57 went to Amazon and enquired about it. He did it with the best intentions so there's certainly no animosity or anything there, but we just have to be very careful that EC itself maintains complete control over its development so that the security considerations are dealt with. Even such minor things like the app logo and title needs to be carefully thought of, as not everybody who is closeted may be comfortable downloading an app that isn't discreet and has a suspicious name. That will definitely be the case if parent's snoop on phones or receive email invoices for any apps downloaded etc. That is essentially why we had to act so swiftly on that previous situation. The app is certainly high up on my list of things to get the ball rolling on, but we have to be careful that we don't sacrifice security and privacy considerations just to help us get something out more quickly. Martin.
