Coronavirus contact tracing app - will you use it?

[savvypaul]

Problem is an independent app is not a viable option as this has to be public funded and run on a national basis. 80% of smartphone owners said they are happy to sign up based on opinion polls. You only have to provide first 3 digits of your postcode and no other personal information apparently. If you have a driving licence the govt has more personal info than this app keeps.

The issue is where the data is stored. Other countries leave the data on the phones and the phones communicate with each other. The UK version submits all your data, with consent to use it for pretty much anything, straight to Dominic Cummings. I've spoken to a couple of IT guys, they won't be downloading it.

It's not keeping much useful information. i'm sure the govt knows more about us already. I just wish people would stop using Dominic Cummings as some bogeyman. He is an advisor and not running the country and making decisions for Boris and the cabinet. Can't see why your current location or whether you have Covid 19 would interest him on an individual basis. I'm sure if he keeps generating negative publicity he will outlive his usefulness.

If it's not useful information, why is the app's data agreement so wide ranging? Why do other governments not need to have the information stored centrally, but our government does?

Cummings is a very, very clever guy, but he has no moral compass, so I don't think your wish is going to be granted.

[SteveTheShadow]

“Computer - Locate Mr Data“
”Mr Data is not aboard the Enterprise”

[Classicrock]

The issue is where the data is stored. Other countries leave the data on the phones and the phones communicate with each other. The UK version submits all your data, with consent to use it for pretty much anything, straight to Dominic Cummings. I've spoken to a couple of IT guys, they won't be downloading it.

It's not keeping much useful information. i'm sure the govt knows more about us already. I just wish people would stop using Dominic Cummings as some bogeyman. He is an advisor and not running the country and making decisions for Boris and the cabinet. Can't see why your current location or whether you have Covid 19 would interest him on an individual basis. I'm sure if he keeps generating negative publicity he will outlive his usefulness.

If it's not useful information, why is the app's data agreement so wide ranging? Why do other governments not need to have the information stored centrally, but our government does?

Cummings is a very, very clever guy, but he has no moral compass, so I don't think your wish is going to be granted.

The app is centralist because the UK civil service is centralist thinking in mindset. Same criticism has been made over testing. My view is they should sack most of them and bring in outside experts. Props to Patel for making one of them jump ship. My point is Cummings is not the PM or a minister. He may well be indispensable if the government are lacking in anyone else with a clue as to what they are doing. I see they are still struggling to repatriate people and are always working weeks behind the curve. Why is it announcements are made and nothing happens in short measure? Any politician is battling against a juggernaut which is why someone like Cummings is seen as useful. This has been an issue for all parties in power.

[savvypaul]

The app is centralist because the UK civil service is centralist thinking in mindset. Same criticism has been made over testing. My view is they should sack most of them and bring in outside experts. Props to Patel for making one of them jump ship. My point is Cummings is not the PM or a minister. He may well be indispensable if the government are lacking in anyone else with a clue as to what they are doing. I see they are still struggling to repatriate people and are always working weeks behind the curve. Why is it announcements are made and nothing happens in short measure? Any politician is battling against a juggernaut which is why someone like Cummings is seen as useful. This has been an issue for all parties in power.

My view is the Civil Service should be properly resourced. In the last 10 years it has been severely cut back and many of it's best people have been lost.

[TheMadMick]

The app is centralist because the UK civil service is centralist thinking in mindset. Same criticism has been made over testing. My view is they should sack most of them and bring in outside experts. Props to Patel for making one of them jump ship. My point is Cummings is not the PM or a minister. He may well be indispensable if the government are lacking in anyone else with a clue as to what they are doing. I see they are still struggling to repatriate people and are always working weeks behind the curve. Why is it announcements are made and nothing happens in short measure? Any politician is battling against a juggernaut which is why someone like Cummings is seen as useful. This has been an issue for all parties in power.

My view is the Civil Service should be properly resourced. In the last 10 years it has been severely cut back and many of it's best people have been lost.

As an ex civil servant I know that if you pay peanuts you get monkeys. Lots of lovely people but not a lot can manage a project. This app will have been contracted out in my opinion.

[slinger]

That's precisely the problem. It has been contracted out, so there's currently very little intelligent official oversight. Even now they're trying to "improve" privacy safeguards.

The Information Commissioner’s Office, which is the U.K. data regulator, said that “as a general rule, a decentralized approach” would be more in line with its principles.

Orla Lynskey, a law professor at the London School of Economics, told the U.K. government’s human rights select committee on Monday: “There is an inherent risk that if you create a system that can be added to incrementally, you could do so in a way that is very privacy-invasive.”

Even Matthew Gould, chief executive of NHSX who, technically, built the thing (although different "teams" were involved) told Parliament on Monday, “I can’t give you a definitive list of exactly who would have access to the data.”

Equally worrying (to me at least) is that an artificial intelligence firm previously hired by Dominic Cummings to work on the Vote Leave campaign has been intimately involved in R&D for the app.

[slinger]

UK may ditch NHS contact-tracing app for Apple and Google model
MPs and rights groups have warned lack of data protection could make UK app illegal.
Thu 7 May 2020 20.54 BST

The government has left open the prospect of ditching its own contact-tracing app in favour of the “decentralised” model favoured by Apple and Google after it was revealed that a feasibility study into such a change is underway.

After repeated warnings that the UK will be an outlier if it insists on using its own centralised app rather than relying on Google and Apple’s technology, rights groups and MPs said on Thursday that the lack of privacy and data protection could mean that the app would be illegal.

With growing questions over that approach, it emerged that the Swiss-based consultancy Zühlke Engineering has been hired to undertake a two-week “technical spike” to investigate implementing Apple and Google’s system “within the existing proximity mobile application and platform”.

Zühlke has already been working on the contact-tracing app since March, documents published this week show, but a new outsourcing contract, first reported by the Financial Times and uncovered by public sector analysts Tussell, shows that the government is now seriously considering changing how the application works to overcome problems with its initial approach.

After one source told the Guardian that Downing Street was now sceptical of decisions made in the health service to create a separate app, No 10 sources played down the idea of any division.

But the prime minister’s official spokesman left open the possibility that a change could be made, telling reporters: “We’ve set out our plans for a centralised model and that’s what we are taking forwards but we will keep all options under review to make sure the app is as effective as possible.”

Under the current plans, NHSX would build its own app, and use a “centralised” model for the service, in which information about who has had contact with who would be shared, in anonymised form, with the health service itself.

The centralised model brings advantages in terms of useful insights into the spread of the disease, but also imposes technical limitations that the government has not been able to fully overcome. The Guardian reported on Wednesday that the app relies on a form of “Android herd immunity”, facing connectivity issues in situations where there are not enough users of Google’s smartphone operating system.

A switch to the decentralised approach created by Apple and Google themselves would solve these connectivity issues, but limit the visibility the NHS has on the wider spread of the virus.

SOURCE

[savvypaul]

Watching government minister George Eustice on Question Time. He cant explain how the app works or what the arrangements for testing / isolation are.

Fiona Bruce says you must have some idea because you are live with it on the IOW. Eustice says that's all got to be worked out.

[karatestu]

Another waste of time, money and people's lives. What a bunch of clowns

[Classicrock]

I think that article rather points to the problem with civil service and NHS management. Good thing if ministers have realised at last they can't be trusted. Don't expect politicians to know technical detail as they aren't IT experts. How much detail do they get told? If you remember the Yes Minister comedy that was thought to be pretty near the truth at the time. Maybe Cummings is responsible for change in tack here. Until last couple of days was anyone aware that a ready to go app was being used everywhere else from Google? I suppose this might be easy to research but I bet Ministers concerned weren't aware of this when NHS as it appears and not govt decided to develop their own. I think the government need to get a grip and own this situation by overriding some of the NHS management and Civil servants. I'm sure whatever government was in power the same issues would have arisen. Another thing that came out of Question Time is that only 20% uptake of app on first day. Two things about NHS. They had no proper logistics system and incompetent with IT. So first govt had to build a new logistics system with help of the army and now it looks like they might go for an outside technology for the app. It's not a great situation if people trust Google and Apple more than the NHS. I can't say it's good that two US IT giants are exerting a greater grip on our lives.