![]() ![]() “This fix is a one-line thing where you remove a line that logs sensitive information to the system log. It’s such an obvious fix, and I was flabbergasted that it wasn’t seen as that. The company found no similar issues with the iPhone version of the framework. AppCensus was testing the system as part of a contract with the Department of Homeland Security. Since then, millions of people have downloaded contact tracing apps developed through Apple’s and Google’s framework: The U.K.’s National Health Services’ app has at least 16 million users, while Canada’s Digital Service COVID Alert app boasted more than six million downloads in January, and Virginia’s Department of Health noted more than two million residents were using its COVIDWISE app.Ĭalifornia governor Gavin Newsom endorsed his state’s version of the app, calling it “100% private & secure” in a tweet last December.īut The Markup has learned that not only does the Android version of the contact tracing tool contain a privacy flaw, but when researchers from the privacy analysis firm AppCensus alerted Google to the problem back in February of this year, Google failed to change it. “Our goal is to empower with another tool to help combat the virus while protecting user privacy,” Google CEO Sundar Pichai wrote in a tweet last May, when the framework became publicly available.Īpple CEO Tim Cook provided similar assurances. Google and Apple provided assurances that the data generated through the apps-people’s movements, who they might have come in contact with, and whether they reported testing positive for COVID-19-would be anonymized and would never be shared with anyone other than public health agencies. When Google and Apple introduced their COVID-19 contact tracing framework in April 2020, the companies aimed to reassure people worried about sharing private health information with major corporations.
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