Apple and Google on Wednesday released long-awaited smartphone technology to notify people if they might have been exposed to the coronavirus.
The companies said 22 countries and several US states are already planning to build voluntary phone apps using their software. It relies on Bluetooth wireless technology to detect when someone who downloaded the app has spent time near another user who later tests positive.
Many governments have already tried, mostly unsuccessfully, to roll out their own phone apps to fight the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic. Many of those apps have encountered technical problems on Apple and Android phones and haven’t been widely adopted. They often use GPS to track people’s location, which Apple and Google are banning from their new tool due to privacy and accuracy concerns.
Public health agencies from across the globe have been waiting to use the Apple-Google model, while some governments have said the tech giants’ privacy restrictions will be a hindrance because public health workers will have no access to the data.
The companies said they’re not trying to replace contact tracing, a pillar of infection control that involves trained public health workers reaching out to people who may have been exposed to an infected person. But they said their automatic “exposure notification” system can augment that process and slow the spread of Covid-19 by virus carriers who are interacting with strangers and aren’t yet showing symptoms.
The identity of app users will be protected by encryption and anonymous identifier beacons that change often. “User adoption is key to success and these privacy protections are the best way to encourage use of such apps,” the companies said.
