Corona Daily 076: Whatever Happened to the Covid Apps?

Do you remember the variety of contact tracing apps launched a year ago? Download the app and keep Bluetooth on. One fine morning you may get an alert saying a passenger (complete stranger) in your bus has tested positive. Could you go into self-isolation for ten days please?

India’s Aarogya Setu (Health Bridge), with 50 million downloads in the first two weeks, became the world’s fastest growing app, beating Pokemon Go.

In April 2020, Google and Apple, the two giants – competitors – improbably came together to develop an app. Their systems run 99% of the world’s software.

The vision or dream was that the elderly and vulnerable stay at home, everyone else goes about business as usual. Only those getting an alert go into isolation. Modern technology would keep the economy and businesses running. Except the people in isolation or quarantine, life would be normal.

The vision turned out to be a fantasy.

*****

Bluetooth was capable of producing a huge number of false alerts. GPS-enabled smartphones are accurate up to a 16 feet radius under the open sky. But the social distancing guideline was six feet. You could end up in isolation thanks to a person waiting at the bus stop on the opposite side of the road.

One challenge for the apps was that they must run 24x7 to be effective. The battery started running out rapidly, some android manufacturers shut down the apps to save battery life.

*****

Google/Apple mechanism made certain improvements. A log entry was added to the phone, only if the two smartphones were in proximity for at least five minutes.

The software relied on the Bluetooth signals to estimate the distance without needing to know people’s locations (a privacy concern). And rotating IDs were used, instead of real names. They called it “exposure notification” rather than “contact tracing”, which was more intimidating.

*****

Strangely, no country attempted to run trials. Just like medicines and vaccines, a covid app is a health related product.

The software privacy features meant no studies could be conducted to check if alerts really helped reduce virus transmissions. Researchers need names of people to talk to, not rotating ID numbers.

*****

South Korea treated contact tracing as a detective job. They combined the app with CCTV footage, credit card records, GPS data from the cars and phones. South Koreans’ smartphones vibrated when a new case was discovered in the district. The apps detailed the hour-by-hour, minute-by-minute timeline of infected people’s travel. Which buses they took, where did they get on and off, whether they were wearing masks.

South Koreans ordered into self-quarantine had to download another app. That app showed if the person violated the quarantine. The fine was $2500, payable online.

Alipay, a Chinese app generated a QR code in three colours. A green code on your smartphone meant you could move freely. A yellow code must stay at home for seven days. Red meant a two-week quarantine. (See clip above: passengers must show green code on smartphones before boarding an underground train).

Relative success in South Korea and China could be attributed to large scale; rapid testing, quick results without which contact tracing is not effective. More importantly, South Koreans were voluntarily willing to sacrifice their privacy. In China, privacy concerns didn’t cross anybody’s mind.  

*****

It is not known to what extent the apps helped China crush the coronavirus. If they did, people living in constitutional democracies may feel angry about the inability and unwillingness of their States to enforce the measures, and the citizens to accept them. In the USA, UK, Europe and India, hundreds of thousands of lives may have been lost because privacy and freedom are more valued than unproven apps that allow the governments to get greater control over our lives.  

Yes, freedom always comes at a price. And usually the price you pay for it is permanent. Once freedom is taken away, it is rarely given back.

Is it worth losing lives for concerns over privacy and government controls? In my view, it is. Because life itself is not life without freedom.

Ravi