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The Federal Government is planning to release a new app to help it track and trace coronavirus.
Key points:
- The Government's coronavirus app will track contact with other people, not your location
- It will automatically collect the phone number, name, age and postcode of a person you are physically near for more than 15 minutes
- This information is encrypted and stored locally on your phone. It will only be uploaded to a central government server if you test positive to coronavirus
The tracing app will be a tool to augment traditional manual contact tracing, by using Australians' phones to help detect who they have been in close proximity with.
The proposal has been met with some scepticism over the Government's collection of personal information.
In an interview with 7.30, Government Services Minister Stuart Robert said he planned to release the source code and a privacy impact assessment of the app, in a bid to shore up public confidence around the new digital tracing tool.
The full details of the app still haven't been released, but 7.30 has set out what we know so far.
Will the app track me?
The app is not designed to collect location information.
It's essentially a proximity detector, that will be triggered when two people are within 1.5 metres of each other for a period of more than 15 minutes.
When this occurs, each device will swap an encrypted package (if they both have the app installed) containing the mobile number, name, age range and postcode of the person.
The app must be open on a person's phone to collect data, although it can run in the background when other apps are open.
Importantly, the app will not collect information from other users' phones that do not have the app installed.
Where will my data be stored?
That data is initially stored locally on the person's phone in an encrypted format for 21 days.
That period will be a "rolling 21 days", according to Mr Robert, so when any data reaches the 22nd day, it will be deleted.
If a person tests positive for COVID-19, the data held on their phone about who they have been in contact will then be automatically uploaded to a central data repository set up by the Federal Government called the National Health Data Store.
That data will then be made available to state tracing authorities to assist them in tracking close contacts of positive cases.
Mr Robert said app data uploaded to this database would not be accessible by federal government agencies.
"It's not used by the Commonwealth for any purpose at all. It's only there for state health to use it," he said.
The centralised national data centre storage may be one of the more controversial elements of the scheme.
While some methods of digital tracing have decentralised storage on individual phone devices, the centralised nature of the database could become a target for cyber attacks.
Robert said the Government was putting in place a number of significant measures to protect this data.
The Government is also publicly releasing the source code of the app, which will allow it to be reviewed by cyber experts.
What happens to my data once this is all over?
The details of how that storage centre will work, such as the length of time data will be stored there, are still being determined.
The Government is producing a privacy impact assessment, which will also be released publicly when it is completed.
Australian Information Commissioner, Angelene Falk, said there were already some safeguards in place to ensure that information was not held longer than it needed to be.
"Privacy law already has a requirement that personal information needs to be deleted or de-identified when it's no longer needed for a legal purpose. So, that's an existing safeguard," she told 7.30.
Mr Robert insisted the data would only be used for coronavirus tracking and would not be held beyond the pandemic.
"[The] Government's not going to use your data for anything else," he said.
"And when the pandemic is finished, it gets deleted, the app gets deleted.
"The National Health Data Store, your data there is deleted.
"And that gives you a sense of certainty about how this comes to a conclusion."
That is reassuring for Ms Falk.
"That the information will be deleted on the phone, when it's no longer clinically relevant information, and at the end of the pandemic, are both very important undertakings," she said.
What the experts are saying about coronavirus:
Does this set a precedent of government tracking?
Any emergency powers or measures the Government seeks to rely on during the coronavirus crisis need to be for the minimum time necessary, according to the Human Rights Commissioner, Ed Santow.
"Sunset provisions in the law are really important to signal that," he told 7.30.
"They can be extended if the threat lasts longer than anticipated, but they set a default position that this is not going to be the new normal.
"It's just an emergency measure that will be in place for the minimum time needed."
If I download the app will restrictions be lifted sooner?
This argument has been put forward by the Government, although it hasn't made any firm commitments on lifting restrictions.
Mr Robert reiterated comments made by the Prime Minister that the app could lead to some restrictions being lifted.
"Frankly, if we're going to get a lot more restrictions released and get economic activity back to normal, this is a core part of it," he said.
"If Australians want to get out and about faster and quicker, can I encourage them, when the app becomes available in a week or two, download it and use it."
Your questions on coronavirus answered:
What you need to know about coronavirus:
Topics: government-and-politics, federal-government, data-protection-policy, personal-data-collection-policy, programs-and-initiatives, health, infectious-diseases-other, respiratory-diseases, epidemics-and-pandemics, australia