The Australian Government Launches COVIDSafe Contact Tracing App

Here’s everything you need to now

 

The Australian government has launched its highly-anticipated coronavirus contact tracing app to aid the state and territory health professionals identify individuals who have come into contact with COVID-19.

Greg Hunt, Health Minister, revealed the voluntaryiOS and Android app, named COVIDSafe, and its privacy impact assessment on Sunday afternoon, with app registration to open at 6:00pm AEST.

 

It comes after weeks of speculation on the program, which has been developed by the Digital Transformation Agency and the health department using the code from the TraceTogether app from Singapore.

Despite assurances announced to the public by the government’s ministers, the government is yet to release the source code for independent analysis.

 

The COVIDSafe contact tracing app uses Bluetooth to make ‘digital handshakes’ in order to identify when individuals with the app come one-and-a-half metres of one another for 15 minutes or more.

The contact tracing app does this by logging an “encrypted reference code” for individuals who is also running the app that they come close contact with, then it will provide the them the “date, time and proximity of the contact” details.

 

The code is generated from the users’ information (name, age range, mobile number and postcode) that is required when a user downloads and registers within the app.

The data is “securely encrypted and stored” in the users’ phone for a rolling period of 21 days before deleted. 

If a user of the COVISafe contact tracing app is diagnosed with the coronavirus, a consent will be made to upload the data to the National COVISSafe Data Store on those they have come into close contact with.

 

Reported by the ABC on Friday, 24th April 2020, the multinational cloud provider Amazon Web Services was handed the deal to host the app’s data and it raised questions over access by US authorities. 

Scott Morrison and the government services minister Stuart Robert have denied this, stating that new laws are to be introduced to restrict access to state and territory health data.

Those laws are now anticipated to be released later this month, though Hunt has issued a  determination under the Biosecurity Act to restrict access of data to health professionals in the interim.

Any other access or use, including by law enforcement agencies, will be considered a criminal offence.

The determination also makes it illegal to force someone into downloading and registering with COVIDSafe contact tracing app, this means that it is not required as a pre-condition for employment or entry to premises.

 

Bluetooth concerns

Despite recommendations on Thursday that the app would address the iOS Bluetooth problems experienced with the TraceTogether app, the COVIDSafe contact tracing will require users to keep the app running.

 

While running on Android devices, it will show a sticky notification in the notifications panel if the app is working in the background, while iOS devices the sign that tells the user that the app is running will be a “small ripple in the device image on your app’s home page”.

Another thing is that the, iOS contact tracing app users will be notified if COVIDSafe hasn’t been working for at least 24 hours.

 

Backed with representatives from the Australian Medical Association, the Australian College of Nursing and the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Association, Hunt is now requesting Australians to download and sign-up with the COVIDSafe contact tracing app.

The Australian government targets at least 40 percent of the population in the country to download the app in order to have the best chance to flatten the curve by reducing the spread of coronavirus.

 

“We are now calling on all Australians to download the COVIDSafe app to help protect you, your family and your community from further spread of COVID-19,” he stated in an interview.

“This will be necessary if we are to start easing some of the difficult social restrictions we have had to put in place.”

“It will be one of the critical tools we will use to help protect the health of the community by quickly alerting people who may be at risk of having contact with COVID-19.”

Stay tuned for more updates.