Tag: Contact Tracing

Following the development of the Apple-Google contact tracing app

Jonathan DonnerIdentity and Privacy, Uncategorized

There will be too many stories about the Google/Apple proximity tracing app to list/highlight them all. I’ll update this page from time to time (new items on top) as new developments emerge. If there is anything specifically future focused, like the promise to limit the API’s duration, I will consider a different post.

UK virus-tracing app switches to Apple-Google model
Government now intends to launch an app in the autumn but it may still lack contact-tracing tech.
Exposure Notification API launches to support public health agencies
Apple and Google’s Exposure Notifications technology is available to public health agencies on both iOS and Android.
Apple and Google release first seed of COVID-19 exposure notification API for contact tracing app developers – TechCrunch
Apple and Google have released the first version of their exposure notification API, which they previously called the contact tracing API. This is a developer-focused release, and is a seed of the API in development, with the primary intent of collecting feedback from developers who will be using th…

MIT Technology Review COVID Tracing Tracker

Jonathan DonnerIdentity and Privacy
MIT Technology Review COVID Tracing Tracker
There’s a deluge of apps that detect your covid-19 exposure, often with little transparency. Our Covid Tracing Tracker project will document them.

The Project will track and compare various contact tracing apps using five categories:

  • Is it voluntary?
  • Are there limitations on how the data gets used?
  • Will data be destroyed after a period of time?
  • Is data collection minimized?
  • Is the effort transparent?

MIT Technology Review, 7 May 2020

Change model: better and more comparative information to inform decision-making.

update:

India is forcing people to use its covid app, unlike any other democracy
Millions of Indians have no choice but to download the country’s tracking technology if they want to keep their jobs or avoid reprisals.

A common EU toolbox for contact tracing

Jonathan DonnerIdentity and Privacy
Coronavirus: An EU approach for efficient contact tracing
Coronavirus: An EU approach for efficient contact tracing apps to support gradual lifting of confinement measures

“Welcoming the toolbox, Commissioner for Internal Market Thierry Breton said: “Contact tracing apps to limit the spread of coronavirus can be useful, especially as part of Member States’ exit strategies. However, strong privacy safeguards are a pre-requisite for the uptake of these apps, and therefore their usefulness. While we should be innovative and make the best use of technology in fighting the pandemic, we will not compromise on our values and privacy requirements.”“

European Union Press Release 16 April 2020

Change Model: Standards and common code

Limiting the Apple/Google Contact Tracer to the Crisis Period Only

Jonathan DonnerIdentity and Privacy
Apple and Google pledge to shut down coronavirus tracker when pandemic ends
representatives from each company pledged for the first time to disable the service after the outbreak had been sufficiently contained. Such a decision would have to be made on a region-by-region basis, and it’s unclear how public health authorities would reach such a determination. However, the engineers stated definitively that the APIs were not intended to be maintained indefinitely.

“As part of the change, the daily key is now referred to as the “temporary tracing key,” and the long-term tracing key included in the original specification is no longer present.”

The Verge

Change Model: Code designed for obsolescence?

DP-3T deployments

Jonathan DonnerIdentity and Privacy
DP-3T/documents
This repository contains a proposal for a secure and decentralized privacy-preserving proximity tracing system. Its goal is to simplify and accelerate the process of identifying people who have been in contact with an infected person, thus providing a technological foundation to help slow the spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. The system aims to minimise privacy and security risks for individuals and communities and guarantee the highest level of data protection.

Change Model: Privacy-respecting code for contract tracing, built by consortium and focused on decentralized approaches.

“We are a international consortium of technologists, legal experts, engineers and epidemiologists with a wide range of experience who are interested in ensuring that any proximity tracing technology does not result in governments obtaining surveillance capabilities which will endanger civil society.” –

DP-3T “Who We Are”
Contact tracing app could be launched in Switzerland within weeks
The decentralised contact tracing app DP-3T, designed to alert users who have come into contact with people infected with infectious diseases, …
Germany flips to Apple-Google approach on smartphone contact tracing
Germany changed course on Sunday over which type of smartphone technology it wanted to use to trace coronavirus infections, backing an approach supported by Apple and Google along with a growing number of other European countries.

Oxford Internet Institute: Ethical Guidelines for SARS-CoV-2 Digital Tracking and Tracing Systems

Jonathan DonnerIdentity and Privacy
Ethical Guidelines for SARS-CoV-2 Digital Tracking and Tracing Systems
The World Health Organisation declared COVID-19 a global pandemic on 11th March 2020, recognising that the underlying SARS-CoV-2 has caused the greatest global crisis since World War II. In this article, we present a framework to evaluate whether and to what extent the use of digital systems that track and/or trace potentially infected individuals is not only legal but also ethical. Digital tracking and tracing (DTT) systems may severely limit fundamental rights and freedoms, but they ought not to be deployed in a vacuum of guidance, to ensure that they are ethically justifiable, i.e. coherent with society’s expectations and values. Interventions must be necessary to achieve a specific public health objective, proportional to the seriousness of the public health threat, scientifically sound to support their effectiveness, and time-bounded (1,2). However, this is insufficient. This is why in this article we present a more inclusive framework also comprising twelve enabling factors to guide the design and development of ethical DTT systems.

Morley, Jessica and Cowls, Josh and Taddeo, Mariarosaria and Floridi, Luciano, Ethical Guidelines for SARS-CoV-2 Digital Tracking and Tracing Systems (April 22, 2020). https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3582550

Key Quote: “Only One Chance to Get It Right”

Change Model: Analysis and Guidance for Policymakers and Technologists

Private Tracer

Jonathan DonnerIdentity and Privacy

Private Tracer is open source, privacy by design approach to contact tracing.

PrivateTracer
It Starts With You “Social Distancing” our best weapon against the Corona Virus Pandemic. We stand for Citizen Empowerment and Global Solidarity, because we believe that doing so, it will be a victory not only against the coronavirus, but against all future epidemics and crises that might assail h

Their change model involves creating code that empowers citizens to control and collaborate in tracking their own contacts