Coronavirus: Government contact tracing app will launch Wednesday, PM says

Monday, 18 May 2020

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern reveals a 'digital diary' app for contact tracing will be launched.

The Government will release an app on Wednesday to help people keep track of their movements, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has announced.

Ardern told reporters the tool was best described as a 'digital diary' to aid manual contact tracing efforts.

Since alert level 2 came into effect from 11.59pm on Wednesday, all businesses were able to open, provided they complied with public health guidance about physical distancing and contact tracing.

In response, a flood of digital contact tracing registers have been made available and promoted, raising concerns about a fragmented system that could undermine trust and transparency.

* Coronavirus: New Zealand is one day too slow on 'critical' tracing marker

* Health Ministry consults with spy agency GCSB for Covid-19 tracing

While waiting for a Government-sanctioned contact tracing app, businesses have been turning to private sector solutions, such as Rippl.

The Ministry of Health for weeks has said it's been working on an app to aid manual contact tracing — an essential tool in its fight to track down, isolate and eventually eliminate the coronavirus.

When New Zealand moved to Covid-19 alert level 2 on Thursday, businesses were allowed to reopen.

'Many of you who've been out and about at the weekend will have seen there has been the development of different apps to support contact tracing,' Ardern said.

The new digital diary app would provide 'national consistency' to help New Zealanders record where they've been and when, Ardern said.

It was intended to support manual contact tracing efforts, not replace them, she added.

'While there are other similar apps in this space we wanted to give greater certainty of the use of the data collected.'

The data would be stored in users' devices, rather than held by businesses, Ardern said.

'That's just really responding to some of the concerns I've heard and seen, some people don't want to fill in a paper-based form that will sit in a public place and others have concerns using apps provided by businesses.

'This is an option that means someone can hold their own data for themselves and feel assured about that.

'It's in case in the future you find yourself with Covid-19 you've got an easy reference to tell where you've been.'

The app was an interim solution, she said. The ministry was still working on another app, more like those being used overseas.

Singapore has asked all its citizens to download an app called TraceTogether, which used bluetooth signals between phones to log contacts who come within 2 metres. The Australian Government recently launched a similar app, called Covidsafe.

Dr Andrew Chen, an expert in person tracking technology at Auckland University, said the digital diary sounded like a 'good tool' to help people keep track of their movements.

'From [Ardern's] comments, it does not sound like any data would be shared between devices or with a central government server, so that helps with privacy.

'Along with having up-to-date contact details, this might help people give contact tracers a more comprehensive picture and improve the likelihood of breaking the chain of transmission.'