Reinforcing Responsibility
in the Contract-Tracing Apps

recommendations that will reinforce responsibility in large-scale use of tracing apps

" Police access to COVID check-in data is an affront to our privacy. We need stronger and more consistent rules in place. "

Katharine Kemp and Graham Greenleaf

Background

The contact tracing apps are innovative tools that help identify people exposed to coronavirus. The COVIDSafe app is the one that is used in Australia to support and protect public.

The COVIDSafe app is part of government’s work to slow the spread of COVID-19. COVIDSafe supports the current manual process of finding people who have been in close contact with someone with COVID-19. Without the help of technology, finding close contacts relies on people: (1) being able to recall everyone they have been in close contact with, (2) knowing their contact details. In many cases, people won’t know the names and contact details of everyone they’ve been in close contact with (for example, on public transport). COVIDSafe uses technology to make this process faster and more accurate. The data, once people consent to it being uploaded from app at the time they test positive, and will be held by the federal government on an Amazon Web Services server in Australia.

Our story

Challenge

The message from Prime Minister Scott Morrison has been simple: Download the COVIDSafe app and we can start letting you out of coronavirus lockdown. Morrison also said that will help Australia to go “on the road back to a COVID-safe economy”. Other supports of the technology, similarly argue that it is a “digital vaccine” for the society.

On the other hand, many experts believe that the COVIDSafe strategy is technological hubris: a belief that an app can replace, or at least substantially enhance, the urgent labour-intensive detective work of contact tracing. They believe there are serious security and ethical concerns. They argue the public’s current trust in the government is fragile and the app will add a new dimension to this complexity.

In this project we explore opportunities and concerns regarding the design of a tracing app like COVIDSafe app, and how it can be improved.