COVID Tracker Ireland is a

digital contact tracing Digital contact tracing is a method of contact tracing relying on tracking systems, most often based on mobile devices, to determine contact between an infected patient and a user. It came to public prominence in the form of COVID-19 apps during ...

app released by the

Irish Government The Government of Ireland ( ga, Rialtas na hÉireann) is the cabinet that exercises executive authority in Ireland. The Constitution of Ireland vests executive authority in a government which is headed by the , the head of government. The gover ...

and the

Health Service Executive The Health Service Executive (HSE) ( ga, Feidhmeannacht na Seirbhíse Sláinte) is the publicly funded healthcare system in Ireland, responsible for the provision of health and personal social services. It came into operation on 1 January 2005 ...

on 7 July 2020 to prevent the spread of

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was identified in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. The disease quickl ...

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

. The app uses ENS and

Bluetooth technology Bluetooth is a short-range wireless technology standard that is used for exchanging data between fixed and mobile devices over short distances and building personal area networks (PANs). In the most widely used mode, transmission power is limit ...

to determine whether a user have been a

close contact Close may refer to: Music * ''Close'' (Kim Wilde album), 1988 * ''Close'' (Marvin Sapp album), 2017 * ''Close'' (Sean Bonniwell album), 1969 * "Close" (Sub Focus song), 2014 * "Close" (Nick Jonas song), 2016 * "Close" (Rae Sremmurd song), 201 ...

of someone for more than 15 minutes who tested positive for COVID-19. On 8 July, the app reached one million registered users within 36 hours after its launch, representing more than 30% of the population of Ireland and over a quarter of all smartphone users in the country. As of August 2021, over 3,030,000 people have downloaded the app.

History

The development process of the COVID Tracker app began on 22 March 2020 when the

(HSE) contacted

Waterford "Waterford remains the untaken city" , mapsize = 220px , pushpin_map = Ireland#Europe , pushpin_map_caption = Location within Ireland##Location within Europe , pushpin_relief = 1 , coordinates ...

tech company NearForm to build a

contact tracing app COVID-19 apps include mobile-software applications for digital contact-tracing - i.e. the process of identifying persons ("contacts") who may have been in contact with an infected individual - deployed during the COVID-19 pandemic. Numerous ...

for

using existing

in smartphones to support

contact tracing In public health, contact tracing is the process of identifying persons who may have been exposed to an infected person ("contacts") and subsequent collection of further data to assess transmission. By tracing the contacts of infected individua ...

. The €850,000 project involved representatives from the

Department of Health A health department or health ministry is a part of government which focuses on issues related to the general health of the citizenry. Subnational entities, such as states, counties and cities, often also operate a health department of their o ...

, the

Economic and Social Research Institute The Economic and Social Research Institute is an Irish research institute founded in 1960 to provide evidence-based research used to inform public policy debate and decision-making. The research of the institute focuses on the areas of sustaina ...

(ESRI), the Garda Síochána, the

Irish Army The Irish Army, known simply as the Army ( ga, an tArm), is the land component of the Defence Forces (Ireland), Defence Forces of Republic of Ireland, Ireland.The Defence Forces are made up of the Permanent Defence Forces – the standing bran ...

and

Science Foundation Ireland Science Foundation Ireland (SFI; ga, Fondúireacht Eolaíochta Éireann) is the statutory body in Ireland with responsibility for funding oriented basic and applied research in the areas of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM ...

. NearForm was originally working on a centralised app that would group users' data together for authorities to study, but in May 2020, the development team contacted

Apple An apple is an edible fruit produced by an apple tree (''Malus domestica''). Apple trees are cultivated worldwide and are the most widely grown species in the genus '' Malus''. The tree originated in Central Asia, where its wild ances ...

and

Google Google LLC () is an American Multinational corporation, multinational technology company focusing on Search Engine, search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, software, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, ar ...

to secure beta access to the

Exposure Notifications System The (Google/Apple) Exposure Notification (GAEN) system, originally known as the Privacy-Preserving Contact Tracing Project, is a framework and protocol specification developed by Apple Inc. and Google to facilitate digital contact tracing durin ...

(ENS) developed by the two companies, which allows the COVID Tracker app to guarantee the anonymity of users and ensure any data transfer to contact tracers would happen only with user consent. Within three months of development, the team had a secure, tested and reliable contact tracing app that worked and was ready to be deployed on a national scale. The COVID Tracker app was launched by the

Government of Ireland The Government of Ireland ( ga, Rialtas na hÉireann) is the cabinet that exercises executive authority in Ireland. The Constitution of Ireland vests executive authority in a government which is headed by the , the head of government. The go ...

and the HSE on 7 July 2020 with 862,000 downloads on the first day of launch. The

Northern Ireland Northern Ireland ( ga, Tuaisceart Éireann ; sco, label=Ulster-Scots, Norlin Airlann) is a part of the United Kingdom, situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, that is variously described as a country, province or region. North ...

StopCOVID NI and

Scottish Scottish usually refers to something of, from, or related to Scotland, including: *Scottish Gaelic, a Celtic Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family native to Scotland *Scottish English *Scottish national identity, the Scottish ide ...

Protect Scotland apps are based on the same NearForm technology and interoperate with it. NearForm have made the app source-code freely available under the

MIT License The MIT License is a permissive free software license originating at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the late 1980s. As a permissive license, it puts only very limited restriction on reuse and has, therefore, high license co ...

. In September 2020, NearForm deployed localised versions of the app under the "COVID Alert" brand in the

U.S. state In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its sove ...

s of

Delaware Delaware ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Maryland to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and New Jersey and the Atlantic Ocean to its east. The state takes its name from the adjacen ...

New Jersey New Jersey is a U.S. state, state in the Mid-Atlantic States, Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern United States, Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York (state), New York; on the ea ...

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

and

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; (Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, Ma ...

. On 19 October, the COVID Tracker app became one of the first wave of national apps linked with other countries across the

European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been ...

after being linked with similar contact tracing apps from

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

and

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG),, is a country in Central Europe. It is the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany lies between the Baltic and North Sea to the north and the Alps to the sou ...

. In July 2021, the app was updated to allow people to store and display the

EU Digital COVID Certificate The EU Digital COVID Certificate (EUDCC), known in Italy as the Green Pass, and in France as the Sanitary Pass or Health Pass (''passe sanitaire''), was a COVID-19 vaccine passport created by the European Union (EU), that is valid in all member ...

Contact tracing

The COVID Tracker app uses

Bluetooth Low Energy Bluetooth Low Energy (Bluetooth LE, colloquially BLE, formerly marketed as Bluetooth Smart) is a wireless personal area network technology designed and marketed by the Bluetooth Special Interest Group (Bluetooth SIG) aimed at novel applications ...

and

's and

to generate anonymous IDs to log: * Any phone users are in

with that also has the app installed. * The distance between users' phone and another app users' phone. * The length of time users' phone is near another app users' phone. Every two hours the app downloads a list of anonymous codes which have been shared with the

(HSE) by other people using the app who have tested positive for COVID-19. If a user have been closer than 2 metres for more than 15 minutes with any of these phones, that user will get an alert notification on their phone. The app requires users to turn on the Exposure Notifications service and will only be available to those with phones running

Android 6.0 Marshmallow Android Marshmallow ( codenamed Android M during development) is the sixth major version of the Android operating system developed by Google, being the successor to Android Lollipop. It was announced at Google I/O on May 28, 2015, and release ...

or higher, or

iOS 13 iOS 13 is the thirteenth major release of the iOS mobile operating system developed by Apple Inc. for their iPhone, iPod Touch, and HomePod lines. The successor to iOS 12 on those devices, it was announced at the company's Worldwide Develo ...

.5 or higher.

Privacy and data

The

claims that the COVID Tracker app protects the privacy of all users and was designed to protect users' privacy.

Concerns

On 18 July 2020, researchers at

Trinity College Trinity College may refer to: Australia * Trinity Anglican College, an Anglican coeducational primary and secondary school in , New South Wales * Trinity Catholic College, Auburn, a coeducational school in the inner-western suburbs of Sydney, New ...

Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of the Wicklow Mountains range. At the 2016 ...

issued a report claiming user privacy is not protected adequately in the COVID Tracking app if used with

Google Play Services Google Play Services is a proprietary software package produced by Google for installation on Android devices. It consists of background services and libraries for use by mobile apps running on the device When it was introduced in 2012, it pro ...

. The report shows how Google Play Services used on

Android devices Android is a mobile operating system based on a modified version of the Linux kernel and other open-source software, designed primarily for touchscreen mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets. Android is developed by a consortium of deve ...

sends highly sensitive personal data to Google servers every 20 minutes including users'

IMEI The International Mobile Equipment Identity (IMEI) is a numeric identifier, usually unique, for 3GPP and iDEN mobile phones, as well as some satellite phones. It is usually found printed inside the battery compartment of the phone but can also ...

, hardware serial number,

SIM serial number A typical SIM card (mini-SIM with micro-SIM cutout) A GSM mobile phone file:Simkarte NFC SecureElement.jpg, T-Mobile nano-SIM card with NFC capabilities in the SIM tray of an iPhone 6s file:Tf sim both sides.png, A TracFone Wireless SIM card ha ...

, handset phone number and a

Gmail Gmail is a free email service provided by Google. As of 2019, it had 1.5 billion active user (computing), users worldwide. A user typically accesses Gmail in a web browser or the official mobile app. Google also supports the use of email clien ...

address An address is a collection of information, presented in a mostly fixed format, used to give the location of a building, apartment, or other structure or a plot of land, generally using political boundaries and street names as references, along ...

, which potentially allows for

IP address An Internet Protocol address (IP address) is a numerical label such as that is connected to a computer network that uses the Internet Protocol for communication.. Updated by . An IP address serves two main functions: network interface ident ...

-based

location tracking A positioning system is a system for determining the position of an object in space. One of the most well-known and commonly used positioning systems is the Global Positioning System (GPS). Positioning system technologies exist ranging from worl ...

of the phone. The researchers at Trinity College described the revealed data transfers as "extremely troubling from a privacy viewpoint" while the

Irish Council for Civil Liberties The Irish Council for Civil Liberties ( ga, An Chomhairle um Chearta Daonna) is an Irish non-profit organisation dedicated to supporting the civil liberties and human rights of people in Ireland. History Founded in 1976 by future President Mary ...

described it as being "completely opaque to users and the HSE themselves".

Android battery drainage

On 9 August 2020, it was announced that the HSE was working with

to identify and fix phone battery issues after the COVID Tracker app was reportedly draining

Android Android may refer to: Science and technology * Android (robot), a humanoid robot or synthetic organism designed to imitate a human * Android (operating system), Google's mobile operating system ** Bugdroid, a Google mascot sometimes referred to ...

users' batteries in 5 hours. On 10 August, it was reported that 10% of Android users (86,000) uninstalled the app, following battery drainage issues. On 11 August, the HSE announced that an update had been rolled out to 70% of Android phones, which is expected to fix the issue, and that 45,000 people had reinstalled the app in the last few days.

References

External links

Android app

iOS app

NearForm
{{COVID-19 pandemic in the Republic of Ireland COVID-19 pandemic in the Republic of Ireland Government software Android (operating system) software IOS software COVID-19 contact tracing apps