UK gov considering switch to Apple-Google Covid-19 app tech

[Iota]

I do not trust this government one bit to handle this data how we want them to.

Considering the person actually in charge of delivering this project is the former CEO of the previously hacked Talk Talk, where thousands of customers data was breached and the company heavily fined, the marvellous Baroness Dido Harding? Yeah, it'll never end up on my phone.

[3dcandy]

Considering the person actually in charge of delivering this project is the former CEO of the previously hacked Talk Talk, where thousands of customers data was breached and the company heavily fined, the marvellous Baroness Dido Harding? Yeah, it'll never end up on my phone.

Already the framework is on your phone sir

[philehidiot]

The government already knows more about me than any such app could tell them. Part of that is various security checks against me and members of my family/friends, in order to make sure I'm (probably) not a terrorist... and I know for a fact companies have sold the rest of the information to Russia and China.
This app won't give them anything new.

It's the ease of access. They can find out anything they want. GCHQ has been tapping things since the very first phone lines. The difference is the ease and who can access it. At the moment the cops need a good reason and authority to access cell data. If there aren't safeguards on this then they will just go there and nick you for being in the same room as someone else. If they rush this out as emergency legislation it'll be a privacy disaster and state over-reach will entend that bit further.

For me, the consequences of being arrested are huge, charge or no charge. My employer gets alerted to any arrest, regardless of the charge. I HAVE to defend myself in a meeting with high-ups, regardless of if I've done anything wrong. The firearms lot will be on me like a shot and my missus has government security clearance for her job. I dread to think what happens if I get nicked for something if they even whiff it's suspicious.

Just being arrested in this country has serious consequences. I know someone who gave her prints for the purposes of exclusion from a crime. They were supposed to be destroyed as the case was closed. The cops show up at her home address years later to interview her about a fraudulent cheque..... she worked at the bank and had identified the cheque as fraudulent! They'd kept her prints from a previous enquiry (illegally) and taken the path of least resistance.

The idea of "nothing to hide, nothing to fear" is one of obscene ignorance to the way the police work.

[Richh]

Considering the person actually in charge of delivering this project is the former CEO of the previously hacked Talk Talk, where thousands of customers data was breached and the company heavily fined, the marvellous Baroness Dido Harding? Yeah, it'll never end up on my phone.

Already the framework is on your phone sir

You're not quite correct on that. The front end might already be on his phone but the actual contact tracing app isn't. Google and Apple *have* been pushing their jointly developed DP-3T system around their devices (it arrived on mine about three weeks ago) but the NHSX app doesn't (currently) use DP-3T. It uses its own bluetooth subsystem that goes by the name of Sonar.

One of the multiple reasons why the app development is lagging behind Cockhan's 'mid-May' deployment date is because Sonar basically doesn't work and can't easily be made to. And they appear to be stuck between trying to paint lipstick on the pig or kill it and replace it with a DP-3T based alternative (or in practice, develop both and see which works properly first).

However, even if that happens, the framework that Apple and Google are already wafting onto devices isn't *the* app. It's just a single component of it - the interface to the bluetooth radio. It still needs an approved app to be installed and do all the actual work. Without that, the bluetooth part just sits in code doing nothing.

[3dcandy]

You're not quite correct on that. The front end might already be on his phone but the actual contact tracing app isn't. Google and Apple *have* been pushing their jointly developed DP-3T system around their devices (it arrived on mine about three weeks ago) but the NHSX app doesn't (currently) use DP-3T. It uses its own bluetooth subsystem that goes by the name of Sonar.

One of the multiple reasons why the app development is lagging behind Cockhan's 'mid-May' deployment date is because Sonar basically doesn't work and can't easily be made to. And they appear to be stuck between trying to paint lipstick on the pig or kill it and replace it with a DP-3T based alternative (or in practice, develop both and see which works properly first).

However, even if that happens, the framework that Apple and Google are already wafting onto devices isn't *the* app. It's just a single component of it - the interface to the bluetooth radio. It still needs an approved app to be installed and do all the actual work. Without that, the bluetooth part just sits in code doing nothing.

I said the framework is already there...not the app. My point is all those saying they won't install something and it's already been applied in readyness. A fair few people on here would not agree to even the framework being installed

[Richh]

You were replying directly to Iota's comment about Harding and noting that the NHSX app will never end up on his/her phone, and you responded that the 'framework' was already there. Whether you intended it or not, responding to the quote the way you did reads as though you were implying that the 'framework' you were discussing was related to or part of the NHS app. It isn't.

The 'framework' you are talking about is DP-3T, which is, at time of writing at least, not connected to or utilised by the NHSX app. As per the article this thread's connected to, a switch is being considered but Hancock, in public, still claims the current iteration (or a development thereof) is the one that will go national. We'll see.

[3dcandy]

You were replying directly to Iota's comment about Harding and noting that the NHSX app will never end up on his/her phone, and you responded that the 'framework' was already there. Whether you intended it or not, responding to the quote the way you did reads as though you were implying that the 'framework' you were discussing was related to or part of the NHS app. It isn't.

The 'framework' you are talking about is DP-3T, which is, at time of writing at least, not connected to or utilised by the NHSX app. As per the article this thread's connected to, a switch is being considered but Hancock, in public, still claims the current iteration (or a development thereof) is the one that will go national. We'll see.

No confusion was meant I couldn't think of an easy way to describe DP-3T. It's there already is the point. But as you pointed out it could be mistaken as the app that I was referring to rather than just a way to help rollout in future

[Ttaskmaster]

The idea of "nothing to hide, nothing to fear" is one of obscene ignorance to the way the police work.

The only people who have difficulty accessing your personal data will be you, and anyone with an actually legitimate reason to do so, as they're the only ones following the mountain of red tape required to legitimately access it.

I'm sure the rest of them can 'just happen upon' whatever they need - Fingerprints are probably stored by any phone that uses them for unlock mechanisms. Everything else has been Farcebooked and Twittered, or simply tracked by Google.
Ease of access is no longer a thing, as you just have to log in and look someone up, pretty much.

[DavDarkelf]

It was developed by some NHS digital team. Why they did not go with Google/Apple from the very beginning is beyond me. Anyone with any common sense would have said that would be a way to go. It's also going to work across different countries.

[Iota]

No confusion was meant I couldn't think of an easy way to describe DP-3T.

Erm... DP-3T is the easiest way to describe it? Yes I know the framework is there to be accessible for contact tracing apps that utilise it, the NHSX app doesn't utilise it, even if it did the contact tracing app still wouldn't be installed on my phone. I was responding to phil's post in regards to trusting the information being provided by these applications to be handled correctly by the NHSX team, in a wider context I don't, in a narrower context I definitely don't considering who is in charge of delivering the project.

The framework is a moot point as I don't use bluetooth.

[John_Amstrad]

How is guaranteed that all proximity personal data (e.g. a secret love affair) will be secured and not be processed by various goverment secret services? what is this, a joke?

[Saracen999]

I think in a way you've raised another problem. You've some familarity with programming but its not up to date, not even vaguely (and I say that as desktop developer in a web/cloud word). Any experience an MP will be drawing on will be out of date by at least 5 years at the end of their term (and probably more). I'd rather have MPs that listen and take advice and understand they don't know. The problem with half these Eton boys is they are so convienced they are right they don't listen and just employ yes men.

I think the most important part of a bit of age is losing the common post-uni perspective that you still know it all. My programming experience is WAY out of date. I wouldn't pretend otherwise and I wouldn't presume to judge programming in the modern sense. But while the technical nature of issues will be different, much of the principle of the types if issue won't.

Also, I wasn't for a nano-second suggesting I'm MP material or that they needed my background. That said, now that you kinda mention it, some of my background would be useful, in that I have big corporate experience (big US companies), SME experience, and self-employed experience, and both computer and accounting backgrounds.

What I don't have is the first hint of the inclination to be an MP. Firstly, there's the whole pesky technicality of getting elected. The notion of traipsing round the place, answering daft questions and holding other people's babies (let alone kissing them) fills me with horror. Secondly, even assuming I was appointed by national acclamation (not holding my breath) and bypassed actually bothering with an election, my response, probably in graphic Anglo-Saxon 'vernular' would be semantically similar to "no thanks" with heavy overtones of wondering if the nation had lost it's collective marbles and wondering where we were going to come up with mental health unit big enough to cope with all those doing the acclaiming.

Me? A politician? It makes me shudder. And consider checking out whether there are still any openings on that manned mission to Mars?

The "understand they don't know" bits important.... provided we also accept that MP's are elected to make decisions, not just rubber-stamp collective "expert" opinions. We've seen that over Covid decisions .... not least because putting 21 experts in a room is sure to produce at least 21 opinions .... and a few dissenting view too.

"Expert" opinions often only see one side of an issue, like gold-plating the project, without adequate reference to what's actually needed, how long it'll take or indeed what it costs.

There's a really old cartoon that used to circulate in computer circles showing the different solutions to a problem what analysts proposed, what project managers specified, what programmers produced, etc, all variations of varying complexity on a child's swing. The last panel, an old tyre on a bit of rope tied to a tree branch is headed "what the customer wanted".



Experts are part of the solution but a broader range of experience is required to use it .... which is what many (but not all) MPs don't have, if they did the PPE & party dogsbody route into politics.

Which, referring to an earlier point, is why I said maybe age 30+ ....you can't get that experience to present a broad view without putting in the time. We have to draw a line somewhere or we'll be electing 5-Yr olds. My view is that the time to get that experience in real life should be required ... but time itself isn't sufficient to guarantee experience either.

[mtyson]

Update: "UK virus-tracing app switches to Google-Apple model," reports the BBC.

[spacein_vader]

Better late than never. That's a load off my mind, individually and professionally.

[ik9000]

Better late than never. That's a load off my mind, individually and professionally.

Two interesting things from the bbc article on this was the problems the trials have had with both systems:
1) The NHS app worked well with android, but struggled , really really struggled with apple.
2) The Goopple app works with both but is rubbish at getting distances right. It can't differentiate between a phone in a pocket at 1m and a phone being used at 3m etc etc which makes a big difference to the exposure risk.

[Richh]

@IK9000, a lot of what Hancock said in the briefing (and which you are reporting in the numbered points) is bull.

There are fundamental problems on Android as well as iOS. And the idea that Sonar (the NHSX solution) is significantly better than Exposure Notifications/DP-3T at accurately calculating distance across a range of devices isn't borne out by the beta testing. The best we can say about that is that MH was attempting to deflect and try to find some positives in the abandonment of the thing.

Sonar can't (with any consistent level of accuracy) differentiate between a phone in a pocket at 1m and a phone in the hand at 3m either. They may well have some RSSI processing data to indicate being able to do this on a single pair of example devicesin a specific room, but as a general point, across a range of devices in the wild, no. And *neither* of them can consistently tell the difference between devices a couple of meters apart indoors in a closed space, and the same devices a couple of meters apart out of doors - despite the fact that there is a huge difference in infection risk between one and the other. So at best these apps are only partial solutions. Especially bearing in mind the significant percentage of people who contract (and can communicate) the virus while remaining totally asymptommatic.

He tried at one point to create the impression that G/A and the NHS will now work together to create a hybrid that uses both technologies. Again that is wishful thinking at this point in time - there's nothing from either Google or Apple to indicate that they will incorporate the NHSX distance estimation algorithm into EN.


What was also downright odd about the presentation is that while claiming that an EN-based solution isn't able to accurately estimate the distance between devices to the standards he want, he nevertheless still announced that a future iteration of the NHS app will utilise Exposure Notifications. Whenever they get round to writing it, anyway, because it's now not that important. Which might actually be true - and wouldn't be controversial without the way he and Boris hadn't previously manically oversold the 'world-beating' app it would be every citizen's duty to download and use...