So... NHS Contact Tracing App

[elsiegee40]

 

[jthompson]

[ATTACH]58390[/ATTACH]

 

Where can we get this string?!

[smurfomatic]

Where can we get this string?!

 

Government issue string, £10 per metre. Only available in 50 metre lengths so I hope you don't want to travel too far.

Edited June 20, 2020 by smurfomatic

[Andrew_C]

Government won't be issuing the string. It will be outsourced to Crapita, who will double the price, and you will only be able to ease it.

[smurfomatic]

Government won't be issuing the string. It will be outsourced to Crapita, who will double the price, and you will only be able to ease it.

 

"We're a world leader in string, we have allocated everyone more than enough string to get them through the crisis."

 

Six months later, 1% of the population receive an envelope with 10cm of string and a bill for £3,000

[mikeprice]

Does Dominic Cummings get an extra large ball of string????

 

 

asking for a friend

[jthompson]

Does Dominic Cummings get an extra large ball of string????

 

 

asking for a friend

 

(the thing to do is to pull apart the strands of the string and then tie them together into one long tenuous strand and string that out as far as possible. Technically not breaking the rules) Sorry, this is going off topic and political.

 

Genuine on-topic question: are there any examples yet of a Bluetooth proximity app that works? I know a number of countries have released apps, but are any of them working as needed?

[unixman_again]

[mikeprice]

Wonder which will happen first

 

a) that song getting out of my head

b) me going and having a nice pint in a crowded pub

[Andrew_C]

Wonder which will happen first

 

a) that song getting out of my head

b) me going and having a nice pint in a crowded pub

Or c) a working tracing app that people will actually use

[Reverend_Dan]

Ive just been thinking about the bluetooth distance tracing, I live in a victorian terrace with about just under a metre distance to main footpath outside of my bay window on the front. If i sit on my sofa with the app enabled with bluetooth I will pick up all the people walking past. Oh and there is also a bus stop at one end of the street into town and a pub at the other so its got a fair bit of footfall.

[jthompson]

Ive just been thinking about the bluetooth distance tracing, I live in a victorian terrace with about just under a metre distance to main footpath outside of my bay window on the front. If i sit on my sofa with the app enabled with bluetooth I will pick up all the people walking past. Oh and there is also a bus stop at one end of the street into town and a pub at the other so its got a fair bit of footfall.

 

If you leave your phone plugged into a wall socket and your neighbour on the other side of the wall does the same, then Bluetooth might consider that a substantial enough contact, even though there's a brick wall between you at all times. I suspect that contact-tracing apps would likely have to account for that sort of thing by employing exclusions for certain locations or times of day. That all makes it harder to sell to the public, though.

 

Terahertz radiation like they use in some airport security scanners might be a better part of the spectrum for proximity detection. It'll go through clothing and air for the right sorts of distance but be blocked by walls or other such physical barriers. Completely impractical though: I've no idea if personal-scale devices are even feasible and if they were, the potential privacy violations would be Brooker-esque.

[jmak]

I think it has rules like within X distance for y amount of time, so walking past shouldn't be enough to trigger an alert. Even if you walk past someone who's infected, unless they cough or sneeze directly at you as you breathe in, your chances of catching it are pretty small.

 

By all accounts the app is.... not brilliant??? but I think they've cracked that bit of it [emoji57]

[jthompson]

Might the "for Y amount of time" actually just be "for Z polls during any period Y". Depending on the polling interval used and the values of Z and Y, you could get a false positive from someone walking back and forth past you at just the right times. You might actually want it to behave like that in, say, a supermarket, but not elsewhere. There are so many circles to be squared!

[jmak]

So...

 

The NHS Covid-19 app is now live. They've now moved to the decentralised/anonymised data-storage model. With the original app's design, I was a definite no. I think this has addressed most of my concerns.

 

What's the opinion of the collective?

 

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/nhs-covid-19-app-privacy-information/nhs-test-and-trace-app-early-adopter-trial-august-2020-privacy-notice

 

(Updated today, despite link text)

[mavhc]

Install it, tell everyone you know to install it, and tell everyone they know to install it. Be available to explain why it's not going to track you, because everything's stored locally.

[jmak]

Well, I've just tried to install it, which worked, but when I run it, I get the message "Currently only for NHS Volunteer responders, Isle of Wight and Lewisham" and won't let me continue without an invitation code.

 

Guardian reports that lots of people are making the mistake of downloading the trial version. Well I used a link from the NHS app support website which has a banner saying "Now available in England and Wales" and it takes me to the app I've got installed.

 

Brilliant

 

Edit: I followed a link from The Guardian, which appeared to take me to the same app (it gave me the option to update, not install) and despite the fact I installed it this afternoon and the app information says it was last updated yesterday, it did install an update and it now works [emoji2369]

Edited September 24, 2020 by jmak

[caffrey]

Working here on Android

 

Has anyone done this for the school ? https://www.gov.uk/create-coronavirus-qr-poster

[Brimstone]

Well, I've just tried to install it, which worked, but when I run it, I get the message "Currently only for NHS Volunteer responders, Isle of Wight and Lewisham" and won't let me continue without an invitation code.

 

Guardian reports that lots of people are making the mistake of downloading the trial version. Well I used a link from the NHS app support website which has a banner saying "Now available in England and Wales" and it takes me to the app I've got installed.

 

Brilliant

Mine has worked (iOS) without any issues at all..?

[psydii]

Working here on Android

 

Has anyone done this for the school ? https://www.gov.uk/create-coronavirus-qr-poster

 

"You should create and display a QR code if you are a business, place of worship or community organisation with a physical location that is open to the public"

 

We are very much not open to the public. Only the kids and staff on site, with the occasional necessary contractor.

[JordanT91]

Working here on Android

 

Has anyone done this for the school ? https://www.gov.uk/create-coronavirus-qr-poster

 

Guidance says you don't need to, unless you do lettings etc.

[jthompson]

As much as I'd like the app to be a success, I think I'll maintain my policy of not being a first adopter. I'm happy to let everyone else find out whether or not there are some extra privacy-phobic features in there designed to mitigate all the false positives. I'm as sceptical as ever of Bluetooth being anything but lousy for contact detection. I suspect the app will find success as a general information source for users (local infection rate, test booking & results, venue check-in/out) but garbage as a contact detector. The former also doesn't rely on a network effect.

[mavhc]

It'll be super lousy if you don't install it at all.

 

I'm putting up QR codes just to encourage use of the app

[elsiegee40]

Installed here. We’ll see if it helps.

[jmak]

As much as I'd like the app to be a success, I think I'll maintain my policy of not being a first adopter. I'm happy to let everyone else find out whether or not there are some extra privacy-phobic features in there designed to mitigate all the false positives. I'm as sceptical as ever of Bluetooth being anything but lousy for contact detection. I suspect the app will find success as a general information source for users (local infection rate, test booking & results, venue check-in/out) but garbage as a contact detector. The former also doesn't rely on a network effect.

I think (being positive) it remains to be seen how effective the Bluetooth proximity detection is.

 

However the built in track and trace seems to add quite a lot of value. The current track and trace organisation is performing very poorly (that's not political - why it's the case is up for debate, but not here). If enough people use the app, contacting people who have been at a particular location will be automated and instant. It's also more anonymous than leaving your details at every place you visit and relying on the staff there to look after and dispose of your data.

 

Hopefully they'll also be able to adjust the algorithm for the Bluetooth proximity measure by linking test results to notifications.