Government’s COVIDsafe app comes with privacy guarantee

If today’s beach crowds are any guide, Australians are itching to get back to normality. From tonight, we may be a step closer, with the launch of the government’s tracing app.

Australians will be able to register for the COVIDSafe contact tracing app from 6pm tonight, with federal health authorities expecting more than half of all Australians to download it.

Health Minister Greg Hunt said the app would help solve cases of coronavirus with no apparent source.

“There are over 500 cases in Australia where we never found the original source. It may be that two people have been standing in a line and one of them had accidentally been a little bit close. It may have been on public transport,” Mr Hunt said in Canberra on Sunday.

The software is designed to help authorities track down anyone who has come into contact with confirmed cases of COVID-19, seeking to eliminate the risk of any forgotten interactions by recording the details of any two users of the app who come into contact with each other.

“How does it work? Very simply,” Mr Hunt explained.

“Download the app and subsequently register from 6pm today. You then have your app open and it provides a Bluetooth handshake and it sits on your phone.

“No-one has access to that (data), not even yourself, no Commonwealth officials.

“Only a state public health official can be given access to that data, and only after you have then consented for a second time.”

Large crowds exercising on the Bondi to Bronte walk around McKenzies Beach on Sunday. Photographer: Adam Yip

The government has been at pains to stress the security of the app, vowing to legislate the protection of user data.

Mr Hunt said courts would not be allowed to access data from the COVIDSafe app.

He said the data would be deleted at the end of the pandemic and claimed it was the safest in the world.

“It is voluntary because we believe in that. Secondly, this is, as the Attorney-General has said, probably the safest data that has been provided by any group at any time in Australian history.

“It is the most basic of data, simply about helping to save your life, to protect your life and to protect the lives of our nurses and dock is and those with whom they come in contact.

“The safeguards that have been put in place are the strongest ever. Not even a court order can penetrate the law .... not even a court order during the investigation of an alleged crime would allow the data to be used.

“So to the best of their knowledge there has never been a set of protections like those which have been put in place under law for this app.”

Chief Medical Officer Brendan Murphy said he expected more than half of all Australians to download the COVIDSafe app.

Scott Morrison has said 40 per cent of Australians would need to download it for social distancing restrictions to be lifted in full.

Professor Murphy did not have a firm baseline for the app to be considered successful, but expected Australians would embrace it.

“Good uptake, in my mind, would be well over half the people and I think we will get it ... Australians will rise to the challenge because they have risen to the challenge of distancing, they have risen to the challenge of testing,” Professor Murphy said.

“We are one of the best countries in the world in our response and that is because of our people.

“All Australians want to know is that this app is safe in their privacy is protected and it is used for that purpose. This is bolted on security. I think they will take it up.”

Mr Hunt has encouraged users to disclose their real identities.

“You can use a fake name. That is legally available,” Mr Hunt said in Canberra.

“This is about making sure that anybody who has been in contact with somebody diagnosed can be notified to protect them and we want to make sure that contact is there so a name helps.

“Obviously it is better, I think, if it is exactly who you are but above all else we want to be able to be in contact for the state health officials to be in contact.”

Mr Hunt’s push for Australians to download COVIDSafe is being supported today by the Australia Medical Association and the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation.

The nation’s bank bosses have thrown their support behind the app, saying the technology is important in further suppressing the virus and allowing everyone to return to normal life — including getting the economy get back to work.

Commonwealth Bank chief executive Matt Comyn said on Sunday he plans to download the app and use it himself.

“We believe the use of the Government’s contact tracing app will play an important role in further suppressing the transmission of the coronavirus and help give Australians the confidence to gradually return to everyday life,” Mr Comyn said.

“A tracing app will significantly improve what is largely a manual and imprecise process and add to the major success that Australia has had in substantially flattening the curve of infection and limiting the tragic loss of life to one of the lowest levels in the developed world”.

“Such contact tracing technology will require broad adoption if it is to be successful.

The app’s website says the Health Minister will also make a directive under the Biosecurity Act to ensure private data is only accessed by state health officials.

“Collection and use of information from the app is consent-based and consistent with the Privacy Act and Australian Privacy Principles,” the COVIDSafe site says.

“To further strengthen the app’s privacy arrangements the Health Minister made a Determination under the Biosecurity Act to protect people’s privacy and restrict access to app information to state or territory health authorities for contact tracing.

“These provisions will be enshrined in legislation when Parliament returns in May.”