In czech republic we already started doing this today [0]
Of course, it requires permission from the infected person
[0] http://www.apms.cz/novinky/mobilni-operatori-pomahaji-trasov...
U.S. govt, tech industry discuss using location data to combat coronavirus
161–170 of 186 posts
Re: U.S. govt, tech industry discuss using location data to combat coronavirus
#162[dead]
Re: U.S. govt, tech industry discuss using location data to combat coronavirus
#163Everyone should immediately go buy a firearm right now. It's your civic duty to defend against tyranny.
Re: U.S. govt, tech industry discuss using location data to combat coronavirus
#164I’m young and thus likely naive. But, is it not possible for a company like Mozilla to make a small tracking app that users opt in for. Then, they get rid of this when it is all over. I say Mozilla because, from what I understand, it is very privacy orientated, but any trustable company would do (ie not google, amazon, or Facebook).
Re: U.S. govt, tech industry discuss using location data to combat coronavirus
#165The conversation is dominated by the fear of gov't abuse. So few point to how successfully South Korea has leveraged their vast surveillance infrastructure to tackle this problem while maintaining a vibrant democracy. (When's the last time the US actually imprisoned a leader? Or even held a powerful person to account without pardon?) The lack of trust in the US is really disappointing. Americans are so proud of its d…
> When's the last time the US actually imprisoned a leader? Or even held a powerful person to account without pardon?
Chelsea Manning comes to mind, and that's just in the past month.
Re: U.S. govt, tech industry discuss using location data to combat coronavirus
#166The interesting thing about ideas like this is that they reveal how authoritarianism during times of stability does a terrible amount of damage during times of crisis. This is the sort of problem that could be solved in a better world; collecting location data to find interactions between people would allow you to get them tested faster and prevent a disease from spreading. But it simply can't be done in this country…
When they turn in the extra tracking, will non-American data get collected too?
Re: U.S. govt, tech industry discuss using location data to combat coronavirus
#167The interesting thing about ideas like this is that they reveal how authoritarianism during times of stability does a terrible amount of damage during times of crisis. This is the sort of problem that could be solved in a better world; collecting location data to find interactions between people would allow you to get them tested faster and prevent a disease from spreading. But it simply can't be done in this country…
Privacy should be a right. In the USA it should be up there with the Bill of Rights. The only way it can be gone around is with a warrant or something similar. Cops don't like that and neither do police state regimes.
Re: U.S. govt, tech industry discuss using location data to combat coronavirus
#168Earlier quoted context omitted.
Personally, I think the only way we will retake our privacy is when hobby level, readily available hardware, software, and 3d printable parts enable hobbyists to create “good enough” phones with encryption and privacy options that won’t exist in mass market phones. Then an enterprising startup can deliver marked-up, preassembled devices, then people might have privacy again.
The goalposts on "good enough" keep moving. When everyone else has a holographic direct-to-eye refraction display, people are going to be as disappointed in a 2020-level smartphone as people were with OpenMoko devices, which still had a pressure-sensitive touch screen with a plastic stylus when the iPhone has just come out with its relatively massive capacitive multitouch display.
Depends...'good enough' goalposts are for a particular audience. Technophobes seeking privacy are certainly less motivated to upgrade to a holographic direct-to-eye display, than a technophile.
Re: U.S. govt, tech industry discuss using location data to combat coronavirus
#169Earlier quoted context omitted.
Every time I think about this issue, the closest I can get is a distributed world of APIs, where everyone hosts their own data [however], and for any service whether it be government, commercial, work, friendly, etc, the entity's agent makes an API request and gets a result. But that result isn't the data - it's a privacy-focused result that can be used in place of the data. The simple example would be "I'd like to s…
This could be possible if the data is stored encrypted in a public ledger (blockchain), which has time-locked script functions that permit another key to decrypt certain pieces of data for a limited duration. I think something like this is a primary goal of most decentralized identity projects, some of which have been underway for around a decade. Of course none of this stops the person with temporary access from mak…
I think the solution would be sending as little data as possible to answer the query, and choosing which/how many queries to respond to. Any large scale requests for data would have to be designed in a way that minimizes intrusiveness or risks being largely ignored. I don't think there's a great way to counter spoofing or sending garbage results without sacrificing user control, but the onus to de-noise should be on whatever institution is attempting to collate data. Additionally, if it's an opt-in system focused on public good there would generally not be much incentive to mess with it as long as users are somehow verified as being in the community (cert generated/granted once after initial identity check, etc). Sadly this is all very pie in the sky at the moment, the amount of cultural change + added infrastructure required for any system like this at the scale of a country would be insane
Re: U.S. govt, tech industry discuss using location data to combat coronavirus
#170They already have a mechanism to do this -- it's called a John Doe (wiretap) warrant. What they really want is full take -- the complete location movements of the US population. This would be useful for COVID-19 tracking ... and authoritarian control.
When they pass the laws that require us to keep our powered-on phones on our persons at all times, we'll know that they've perfected the Angel Teeth.
If you're following HK/China, you know that they are already doing this tracking. Visitors and quarantined people are being required to do this in HK by a number of reports.
https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/Coronavirus/Hong-Kong-tell...
Up until the virus, they were mandating no face covering so their all seeing surveillance camera network could see your face.