Indian government officially launches its coronavirus tracking app

Do repost and rate:

Last week, we reported about India building a coronavirus tracker based on your mobile location. Now, the government has officially launched the app with the name of Aarogya Setu (which translates from Sanskrit to ‘A bridge of health’).

The core function of the app remains the same as the beta version: using your phone’s location data and Bluetooth to assess if you’ve been near a person who was infected by COVID-19, by looking through a database of known cases.

We call it disco-tech

TNW2020 is our full-blown tech festival disguised as a conference

LET’S BOOGIE

The app specifies that all your data is on the device in an encrypted form. Looking at the code, it sends your data to the server in an anonymized form to check if you’re near an infected person. To do that, the app will rely on Bluetooth to check if you’ve been within six feet of an infected person.

Aarogya Setu

The app shares your data with the government in case you’ve been tested positive for coronavirus or have been in close contact with a person who was tested positive. For what it’s worth, the app’s privacy policy suggests your data won’t be shared with third-parties.

Aarogya Setu also has some nifty features such as a chatbot to help you determine if you may have coronavirus symptoms, rolling updates from the health ministry, and a list of helpline numbers for each state in India.

Aarogya Setu chatbot

In the past few days, there have been a few data mishaps by state governments in the country. Karnataka published the addresses of hundreds of people under quarantine in an effort to help people stay away from them — a move that put those people at risk of ostracization and possibly worse at the hands of the frightened public. Plus, the personal data of roughly 20 people under isolation in the southern city of Hyderabad, Telangana, was leaked from a government agency’s database.

With this app, the government intends to limit community spread in conjunction with the ongoing 21-day lockdown. The app is available currently on Android and supports 11 languages. Now to see how the Indian government encourages people to use it.

Corona coverage

Read our daily coverage on how the tech industry is responding to the coronavirus and subscribe to our weekly newsletter Coronavirus in Context.

For tips and tricks on working remotely, check out our Growth Quarters articles here or follow us on Twitter.

IndiaGovernment

Regulation and Society adoption

Ждем новостей

Нет новых страниц

Следующая новость