The coronavirus pandemic brings Apple and Google together. The two American tech giants are working on a solution that will make it easier to track patients infected with Covid-19, they said. It is not strictly speaking a tracking application, like the one envisaged by the French government, StopCovid, but a technological base which will allow iPhone and Android smartphones to exchange information.
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The joint solution from Apple and Google is based on the Bluetooth protocol, for short-distance data exchange. It is very similar to that envisaged in France. If two people stay nearby and one of them is infected, the sick person will be encouraged to indicate it in a government application, and to transmit two weeks of history of their meetings. People in the vicinity will be notified once the information has been brought up.
Apple CEO Tim Cook's announcement:
And that of Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google:
Apple and Google jointly assure that their solution, which poses obvious security questions, will respect privacy. Smartphones will create unique identifiers that will be generated every quarter of an hour. It will not be mandatory and will be based on the choice of users. All data on the people met will remain stored on smartphones. A central server will store encryption keys.
The European Data Protection Supervisor reacted rather favorably to this announcement, welcoming a "step forward".
Apple and Google technology will be available in May and can be used by health officials, the two groups said in press releases. They will then integrate it into future versions of their Android and iOS mobile operating systems later this year.
