Lessons learned from Singapore

A mobile phone screens display the Netflix logo next to a coronavirus, COVID-19, illustration graphic background in Arlington, Virginia (Photo by Olivier DOULIERY / AFP)

The government is getting ready to roll out a COVID-19 tracing app to help us trace community infections and get on top of the crisis. The app will be voluntary, and if done right, it could have a huge impact in the fight against COVID-19. On paper at least, it could save lives and get our economy moving again faster.

So, in the coming weeks each of us will have a decision to make – do we download the app or not?

To have the desired impact, the government reckons it’ll need to be used by at least 40 per cent of us. To put that into perspective – that’s roughly the same number of Aussies who use Instagram – one of the most popular apps on the planet. It’s taken Instagram almost 10 years to get there – our government is hoping to do the same in just a few weeks. Under normal circumstances this would be virtually impossible. But things aren’t normal right now.

Yes, our government hasn’t got a great track record on tech initiatives. We all remember what happened with the census and MyHealthRecord. But before we dismiss the app outright – we should think about the potential impact it could have. At the moment contact tracing is a slow and laborious process – and delays can mean lost lives. If it gets widespread adoption, the app will make contact tracing faster and more accurate, and would save lives. And for that reason alone it’s worth exploring.

So let’s put the knee-jerk reactions aside and take a proper look at what’s being proposed. The app is based on the TraceTogether app released by the Singaporean government in March. It’ll use Bluetooth to identify if you’ve been in proximity with another user for an extended period of time. If a user is diagnosed with COVID-19, they’ll be asked for consent to upload the encrypted data to the server. The server can then contact other users who’ve been in proximity with the infected user to let them know they might be infected.

This all sounds great in theory. But the Singaporean app that it’s based on has been a bit of a flop. It was downloaded just over a million times – that’s less than 20 per cent of Singapore’s population.

So why isn’t it working? Privacy concerns are certainly part of it. People understably get nervous when the government wants to record any of their personal data. So far this has been the focus of most of the media’s attention in Australia, and there’s been an alarming amount of misinformation spread about these issues.

From what I’ve seen though the proposed app has been thoughtfully designed to protect users’ privacy. All data is stored in an encrypted form, so you can’t identify other users and they can’t identify you. Most of the data is held on the device itself (rather than a central server run by the government) and is held there for only 21 days. The app does NOT track any GPS or location data (despite that being widely reported in the media) and users can opt out at any time (just delete the app). On top of all this, the government tells us that the source code will be made public so that the security community can ensure that it’s only doing what it’s supposed to do. It’s not 100 per cent secure – no system ever is. But the real privacy risks here are relatively low, especially when compared to the potential benefits.

For the app to work well though, privacy isn’t the only consideration. It’s also got to be convenient. For users in Singapore at least, the experience seems to be pretty poor. Many iPhone users have complained that it doesn’t run in the background or when your phone is locked – so you need to have your phone unlocked and the app on screen for it to work. This means whenever you leave the house you need to remember to open the app and then carry your phone around in your pocket or bag, switched on and unlocked at all times.

This is clearly a pretty big design flaw for iPhone users. With this sort of user experience, you’d expect churn to be very high. In fact, it’s likely the portion of the population actually using it in Singapore is way lower than the 20 per cent reported.

But there’s an elegant solution to this problem on the horizon. Apple and Google are working together to release a protocol for Bluetooth tracing apps that will run natively on the phone’s operating system and can be integrated into other apps (so it could be built into the TraceTogether app). It could run silently in the background, so you don’t have to leave your phone unlocked and can use other apps while it’s working. We’d be crazy not to at least explore working with the consortium on this.

Having two of the largest tech companies throw their validation behind the app will also help solve the other big issue with getting it to work – trust. These companies have some of the best security engineers on the planet, and (at least in the case of Apple) have built a reputation on protecting user privacy. And their privacy protocol actually goes a few steps further than TraceTogether does. It makes sure that the record of any ‘matches’ between users is only ever stored locally on the devices, so that the central server never stores a list of users who have been in proximity to one another.

At the end of the day, this is much more about trust than technology. And unfortunately, the government is starting with a real deficit of trust in this area. If they don’t want this to flop, they need to get on the front foot quickly, before the public makes up its mind. This means publishing the design specs (and the code) quickly, and announcing credible third-party oversight.

It will also need to be done with broad bipartisan support. As with many others, I’ve been a vocal critic of this government’s approach to innovation in recent years – but this is far too important for political point scoring.

So, let’s end the dangerous misinformation and knee jerk reactions. Let’s focus on getting an app that works. One that’s private by design, independently audited and made with user experience in mind.

If we can do all this, I’ll be one of the first to download it. In fact, like many Aussies I’d see it as my civic duty – just like staying at home is today. If done right, the app will literally save lives. And at the end of all this we can all delete it and put this behind us.

James Cameron is an investment partner at AirTree Ventures.