Google, Apple team up to develop virus tracking software
Smartphones will use Bluetooth to constantly monitor nearby devices
In one of the most far-ranging attempts to halt the spread of the coronavirus, Apple and Google said they were building software into smartphones that would tell people if they were recently in contact with someone who was infected with the virus.
The technology giants said they were teaming up to release the tool within several months, building it into the operating systems of the billions of iPhones and Android devices around the world. That would enable the smartphones to constantly log other devices they get close to through the short-range wireless technology Bluetooth, enabling what is known as “contact tracing” of the disease.
During a coronavirus briefing Friday, Gov. Gavin Newsom was asked about the development. “We have engaged those companies ... on that tracing technology. We look forward to continuing to build that capacity and partnership, and that is also part of the planning exercise as we see some light, and we see a future where we’re not all permanently in this current state, this stay at home order.”
The unlikely partnership between Google and Apple, fierce rivals who rarely pass up an opportunity to criticize each other, underscores the seriousness of the health crisis and the power of the two companies whose software runs almost every smartphone in the world. Apple and Google
said their joint effort came together in just the last two weeks.
Their work could prove to be significant in slowing the spread of the coronavirus. Public-health authorities have said that improved tracking of infected people and their contacts could slow the pandemic, and such measures have been effective in places like South Korea that also conducted mass virus testing.
Yet two of the world’s largest tech companies harnessing virtually all of the smartphones on the planet to trace people’s connections raises questions about the reach these behemoths have into individuals’ lives and society.
“It could be a useful tool, but it raises privacy issues,” said Dr. Mike Reid, an assistant professor of medicine and infectious diseases at the University of California, San Francisco, who is helping San Francisco officials with contact tracing. “It’s not going to be
the sole solution, but as part of a robust sophisticated response, it has a role to play.”
With the tool, people infected with the coronavirus would notify a public health app that they have the illness, which would then alert phones that had recently come into proximity with that person’s device. Google and Apple added that people would have to opt in to use the tool.
There are already thirdparty tools for contact tracing, including from public health authorities and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In March, the government of Singapore introduced a similar coronavirus contact-tracing app, called TraceTogether, that also uses Bluetooth signals to detect mobile phones that are nearby.
Apple and Google said they would make the tool’s underlying technology available to third-party apps by mid-May and release the tool publicly “in the coming months.”