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Report Details How Apple and Google Developed Contact Tracing API

That absolutely admirable to have 2 tech giants cooperate solely for the greater good of humanity !
Cannot wait to see that god-tier tech miserably flop though, and not for technical reasons.
 
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0ID said:
and the data is aggregated and Google sells it to whoever. What will do Apple with the data? Pass to?
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Neither Apple nor Google receive any data. All they receive are random tokens that give them no information whatsoever.
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UnusedLoginID said:
Too little (only 10% will opt-in) and too late (January 2020 was the right time) and forgets that people without symptoms may be carriers.
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Phase two in May will work without an app installed.

You only need to opt in when either you are tested positive (and unless you are an absolute **** you will opt in at this point because you risk being responsible for people's deaths), or when iOS pops up and says "You have been close to someone who is infected, you better opt in to the app to get more information (in which case it is absolutely in your own self interest to opt in).
 
RecentlyConverted said:
If Google and Apple are doing this for altruistic reasons, I take it that this will run on older iPhones, Android devices and maybe even Windows phones. That way people in the developing world can have the same benefit.
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iPhone 6s and later. People in the developing world don't have older phones, they have fewer and cheaper ones.
 
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gnasher729 said:
iPhone 6s and later. People in the developing world don't have older phones, they have fewer and cheaper ones.
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Shouldn't you be asking "how can I opt in to this"?
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At first yes. Until it becomes one day "how can I opt out of this" and the answer is "you can't".
But one slow step at a time...
 
gnasher729 said:
People in the developing world don't have older phones, they have fewer and cheaper ones.
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That hasn't been my experience overseas. Instead, a phone will be the only piece of technology someone owns… and it might be cheaper, but it seemed one generation back on average not five.
 
ericwn said:
But in the real world there are hardly any people who have both, the tin foil hat AND a smartphone. Just doesn’t go hand in hand.
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Exactly this. I genuinely don't understand... if you don't trust Apple and/or Google, I don't understand how you are carrying a phone around in the first place. If the maker of your phone wanted to be malicious, they wouldn't do it via a documented API, they would just build something into the OS and never tell you. If you feel you need to "opt out" because you don't trust this, how do reconcile that mentality with owning a phone and carrying it around with you everywhere in the first place. Want to "opt-out" ... read Walden by Henry David Thoreau and act accordingly.
 
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gnasher729 said:
iPhone 6s and later. People in the developing world don't have older phones, they have fewer and cheaper ones.
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You are stating it as if it’s a fact. Can you give me a link to any site to back this up. I thought a large number of pre-owned older units ended up in the developing world.
 
citysnaps said:
I don't think you can speak for the majority of people. Indeed, many people who test positive may be asymptomatic and feel just fine. And I suspect would be glad to participate.
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Probably not. Hate to say it but most wont. Human nature is strange
 
glowplug said:
So what to do when there are 50 alerts on your phone saying you have been exposed to COVID-19?
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Follow the instructions the app gives you along with the alerts. Generally, self-isolate, get tested if possible (that's hard to do now, will be easier in the future), and if you start showing severe symptoms, contact your healthcare provider. If you can determine that you are infected (via test, etc), then use the app as instructed to alert others.
 
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RecentlyConverted said:
Out of curiosity, for those that live in major cities, how much memory is this going to take up? From what I understand you have a daily token on your device and a second token which changes approximately every 15 minutes. All these tokens will be stored for 14 days. Also stored will be the token for everyone you come into contact with, the length of time you were in their vicinity, and that too will be stored for 14 days. At a later date, they may store additional information (signal strength- to estimate closeness and maybe weather, such as wind speed, UV levels etc, to estimate increased/decreased risk). Also the latest confirmed COVID cases tokens will be added to your device daily (probably wiping off the previous days).
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I'm assuming you're more worried about storage memory than actual RAM. The critical data seems like it's on the order of 32 bytes per record. Even given gross inefficiencies in storage and indexing, you'd need hundreds of encounters to make up 1MB in an era where new devices have 64,000x that.

I think we'll be okay. :)
 
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gnasher729 said:
Neither Apple nor Google receive any data. All they receive are random tokens that give them no information whatsoever.
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Apple/Google doesn't even receive the random tokens! That's sent by the government-health-authority app to the government-health-authority server. Apple gets nothing.
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MacBH928 said:
how can I opt out of this?
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Don't install the app.
 
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This only really helps the 'unknown'.


citysnaps said:
I think what you're trying to say is that you wouldn't. And then projecting that on others.
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Deliberately sneezing on people, then hearing on the news about them being "famous for 5 second" isn't exactly news worthy either... They just wanna get their mug-shot on tele.
 
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I like the spin -- changing it from "contact tracing" to "exposure notification". See, I knew these guys had smart people working for them. Now if only they used their smarts to figure out how to help us without turning our phones into an ankle bracelet.

So, who is planning to use this? Obviously none of these people.
https://twitter.com/x/status/1256332200871510017
Until their freedoms are taken away by their benevolent civil servants and they are forced to do so by decree.
 
ericwn said:
Thanks for confirming this, especially since the API doesn’t belong to any one state and can be removed but both Apple and Google anytime.
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Riiiiight, like the Five Eyes has NEVER been able to break into consumer devices. Gotcha.
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Chlloret said:
thats right, this Api is no use for a police state, it is there for a tracing app, not a tracking app. So of no interest for a police state, it is of interest for you. You want to find out if you might be infected and need a test. Since nobody else can find out that you got the allert, the police state is left hanging dry.
But if you live in a police state, you should not use a smartphone at all, or dumb phone, or any phone. You certainly should not write on an open forum where you are easyly identified and a post like yours brings your social score down by double didgits.
Do you know what a police state is?
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Oh, wait what's this? The US, UK, etc aren't police states? Ok. Thanks for the reassurance!
 
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