Apple and Google partner on Covid-19 contact tracing technology • Hacker News Board

Re: Apple and Google partner on Covid-19 contact tracing technology

#461

Post by tinus_hn » Sat, Apr 11, 2020, 11:04 AM UTC

foota wrote: post #155

tinus_hn wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You do know that there also is a Find My Device service for Android that runs on all Android phones?

This is very different than what you think when you hear "find my iPhone|Android". Iirc the find my iPhone tech does phone to phone association to identify the location. See: https://www.wired.com/story/apple-find-my-cryptography-bluet...

This technology which has been announced but not released would, as your link states, ‘let you track down your stolen laptop, but not let anyone track you. Not even Apple.’ What issue do you have with that?

Re: Apple and Google partner on Covid-19 contact tracing technology

#462

Post by TechBro8615 » Sat, Apr 11, 2020, 11:50 AM UTC

sneak wrote: post #436

sitkack wrote: post #416

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Both Apple and Google have the exact location for all users for all time. Both can tell you right now, who you have been in contact with and how many folks they in turn have been in contact with. They aren't building anything new, in fact, this is much less than they already have.

> Both Apple and Google have the exact location for all users for all time. This is a false statement. With location services off, the providers only get coarse location via tower strengths and also via IP geolocation (everything phones home and leaks your IP constantly). It’s not exact, not by a long stretch.

Don’t forget WiFi router Mac address triangulation.

Re: Apple and Google partner on Covid-19 contact tracing technology

#463

Post by ericlavigne » Sat, Apr 11, 2020, 12:42 PM UTC

jka wrote: post #440

ericlavigne wrote: post #430

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The approach outlined by Apple and Google is very similar to, and likely based on, the TCN protocol developed by a coalition of open source projects. If you'd like to discuss possible vulnerabilities and propose further improvements, there's an active community already doing that who would be happy to have one more contributor. :-) https://tcn-coalition.org/

Thank you, I'll take a look into TCN and the protocol. Do you know whether TCN have worked with and/or compared notes with OpenTrace[1]? [1] - https://github.com/OpenTrace-Community

I’m part of the CoEpi project, one of the member projects of the TCN Coalition. I see that some of my teammates are searching through the OpenTrace code to see if anything there is worth taking, such as their device-specific bluetooth range calibrations. I don’t think there’s been any two-way communication between these teams.

Re: Apple and Google partner on Covid-19 contact tracing technology

#464

Post by jlokier » Sat, Apr 11, 2020, 1:05 PM UTC

est31 wrote: post #388

mkagenius wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems like a scenario where bloom filter[1] could be useful. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloom_filter

Bloom filters aren't good for privacy because if there is a hit, you have to upload the id to check it. Which tells the service a) which ID you encountered and b) if it's an ID that was confirmed to be affected, whether you are affected by corona or not, something the system was designed to prevent.

You don't have to upload the full id.

It's enough to upload the bucket that was hit in the Bloom filter to fetch the subset of detailed data that corresponds to the bucket.

If the buckets are coarse enough that doesn't reveal much. And if the Bloom filter is too fine-grained for that, fetch a set of buckets instead of one.

Re: Apple and Google partner on Covid-19 contact tracing technology

#465

Post by pcdoodle » Sat, Apr 11, 2020, 1:10 PM UTC

fauigerzigerk wrote: post #100

Promising opt-in is a bit disingenuous. These tech giants are creating a technological capability. Whether or not it is opt-in, opt-out or mandatory is then decided by governments, now and in the future. This is of course nothing new. But it's worth noting considering how high the tolerance for extremely intrusive government action currently is and how extremely weak any resistance is bound to be. I'm not saying I'm…

I am done helping either company. What a breach of trust to hop on the 1984 bandwagon and we haven't even been trough a full cycle of this.

Re: Apple and Google partner on Covid-19 contact tracing technology

#466

Post by GekkePrutser » Sat, Apr 11, 2020, 1:33 PM UTC

jhhh wrote: post #293

DavideNL wrote: post #174

Am i the only one who thinks it's mindblowing that people use Facebook, Instagram, Linkedin, etc. however now that Apple + Google release a tool to prevent thousands of people from dying in a pandemic they start thinking/complaining about the possible privacy implications? (without even having read the specs or knowing the details...)

How many people complaining in this thread use or don't use Facebook, Instagram and Linkedin? Unless you actually know then it seems like you've contrived a group of hypothetical hypocrite 'complainers' to complain against.

I only use LinkedIn and when I do, I use it in a container so it can't spread its cookies.

LinkedIn is pretty mild anyway in contrary to anything Facebook with their tracking pixels. And unfortunately you can't really do without LinkedIn if you want a job in IT.

Re: Apple and Google partner on Covid-19 contact tracing technology

#467

Post by sneak » Sat, Apr 11, 2020, 1:47 PM UTC

vsl wrote: post #453

sneak wrote: post #437

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Public safety is not a human right, while privacy is. If we abandon our commitments to human rights in times of crisis, how important are they to us, really?

> Public safety is not a human right, while privacy is. Seriously? “Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person” is literally Article 3 of The Universal Declaration of Human Rights - and 1&2 are “this applies to everyone; yes, we mean it”. Privacy is all the way down in Article 12. I’ll take my life, health and freedom, for which targeted suppression of this disease is essential, over my privacy an…

Life and “security of person” are not the same thing as safety.

Re: Apple and Google partner on Covid-19 contact tracing technology

#468

Post by sneak » Sat, Apr 11, 2020, 2:05 PM UTC

TechBro8615 wrote: post #462

sneak wrote: post #436

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Both Apple and Google have the exact location for all users for all time. This is a false statement. With location services off, the providers only get coarse location via tower strengths and also via IP geolocation (everything phones home and leaks your IP constantly). It’s not exact, not by a long stretch.

Don’t forget WiFi router Mac address triangulation.

With location services off, I don’t believe that occurs.

Re: Apple and Google partner on Covid-19 contact tracing technology

#469

Post by Leherenn » Sat, Apr 11, 2020, 2:13 PM UTC

xenospn wrote: post #323

jschwartzi wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bluetooth 5.1 devices can do both distance and direction, so if you have a bunch of beacons you can determine your location to sub-meter accuracy.

iPhones don't have Bluetooth 5.1 yet, and I'm assuming no Android phones either.

Qualcomm's latest flagship soc (865) with 5G has Bluetooth 5.1 support as far as I know.

Re: Apple and Google partner on Covid-19 contact tracing technology

#470

Post by TechBro8615 » Sat, Apr 11, 2020, 2:53 PM UTC

sneak wrote: post #468

TechBro8615 wrote: post #462

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don’t forget WiFi router Mac address triangulation.

With location services off, I don’t believe that occurs.

Depends on the platform. Ultimately all you need is a list of the routers around you; SSID is often sufficient, but mac adddress is optimal since it can be sent to Google API [0] or similar for geolocation. I'm not sure about Android permissions. With iOS, it used to be (like 2 years ago) that any app could get the list of nearby access points, without permission. But AFAIK that was recently changed to be behind a prompt. Not sure if it's the same permission as location services or a different one.

[0] https://developers.google.com/maps/documentation/geolocation...