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Digital tools help to track infections - but the data protection risks are enormous
Photo: WILLY KURNIAWAN / REUTERS
The users of the Indonesian corona app "PeduliLindei" should prove that they are wearing a mask with a facial recognition feature before they enter public buildings.
But that's not all: the app records movement patterns in a digital diary, and users identify themselves with a QR code scanner before they enter restaurants, for example.
According to the government, another function should even be able to determine body temperature.
The app also sends out warnings when corona infected people are nearby - and warns users who keep too little distance from other people.
Since its launch in April, »PeduliLindeli« has grown into a kind of super app with numerous monitoring functions.
Other corona tracking programs also intrude deeply into privacy, especially in Asian countries.
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In the corona crisis, countries around the world are expanding surveillance
Photo: Thomas Peter / REUTERS
The US non-governmental organization “Freedom House” warns in its report “Freedom on the Net 2020” that the global health crisis has accelerated the decline in global internet freedom and digital rights in many countries.
In it, the NGO criticizes an increase in surveillance, restrictions on freedom of expression or the widening of the digital divide.
Governments around the world are using the crisis to expand surveillance powers and justify the use of new technologies.
Sensitive health data are collected, digitized and analyzed en masse all over the world - in some cases without adequate protection against abuse.
The pandemic is being used by governments in countries like China, Bangladesh, Egypt, Venezuela, Belarus or Zimbabwe as an excuse to restrict access to information.
Authorities block independent news sites and arrest critics on charges that they spread false news about the health crisis.
Digital inequality is also increasing worldwide.
Although Internet access has never been as essential as it is now, as important information, services, but also work and lessons are relocated to the Internet during the lockdown, India, African countries, Myanmar and Belarus blocked or switched the Internet in certain regions for political reasons even from cellular networks.
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Countries around the world are trying to track the movement patterns of infected people
Photo: KIM KYUNG-HOON / REUTERS
The Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto, whose researchers are currently testing international Covid-19 apps, warns that apps and data processing and storage
are often unsafe even under normal circumstances.
Since many corona tech projects were developed under great time pressure in order to be operational as quickly as possible in the pandemic, they could more often contain programming errors and other weaknesses.
The team recently uncovered security gaps in the Philippine platform "Covid-Kaya", which health workers use to document infections and forward them to the Ministry of Health.
During their test, the researchers were able to access user data.
Corona apps with security gaps
Irene Poetranto, Senior Researcher at Citizen Lab, observes that more and more functions are gradually being added to some Corona apps such as “PeduliLindeni” - and users are often unclear as to how long and for what purposes their data is being collected and stored.
South Korea also uses a "Smart City" system to track contacts, which was originally developed for urban planning.
The health workers make an effort as if they were looking for criminals: They try to trace the paths and contacts of infected people by evaluating, among other things, credit card data, GPS data from cars and recordings from surveillance cameras, as well as cell data from cell phones.
The movement patterns of people infected with corona are published anonymously online.
In addition, neighbors initially received cell phone messages with information on the sex, age, occupation, nationality and whereabouts of the infected.
"The authorities were too transparent for the details to allow conclusions to be drawn about the identity," criticizes Poetranto.
The government is now sharing at least less data with the population.
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Manila, Philippines: Corona tracking apps could compromise sensitive data if poorly developed
Photo: ELOISA LOPEZ / REUTERS
The concern: Authoritarian states in particular could later misuse the personal data and the movement patterns that they are now collecting to spy out activists or critics.
"Fake news" as a pretext for arrests
Network experts also criticize the fact that some authoritarian governments are restricting access to information during the pandemic - often with reference to “fake news”.
Platforms like Facebook and YouTube are currently inundated with rumors and products about the coronavirus, which are useless or dangerous - but the fight against false information also serves many governments as a pretext to block and delete content on the Internet or to take action against critics .
According to Freedom House, more than 20 states invoked the pandemic this year to enforce restrictions on freedom of expression.
In some cases, governments passed vaguely worded laws that criminalize “fake news” or content that harms “public order”.
In order to suppress corona statistics and critical reports on the crisis, governments in at least 28 countries blocked websites or forced users, social media platforms or the media to delete information.
And in 45 out of 65 countries examined, activists, journalists and citizens have been arrested or convicted because of Covid-19 contributions on the Internet.
In China alone, moderators of the Chinese universal app “WeChat” and the live streaming platform “YY” censored millions of content on more than 2000 keywords, including harmless questions or impressions about the corona crisis.
In Zimbabwe, users risk up to 20 years in prison for commenting on the health crisis, which the government has classified as misinformation.
The government also arrested an investigative journalist who reported on Twitter about corruption in food distributions during the corona lockdown.
In Thailand, more than 150 people have been sentenced to prison or fined in connection with corona statements since February 2020 - a man was arrested after writing on Facebook that he had not been tested for corona at the airport.
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Anyone who criticizes the Corona policy online in Zimbabwe risks imprisonment
Photo: Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi / AP
The corona crisis also highlights how problematic it is when countries block the network: "Some states switch off the Internet for marginalized groups and thus expand and deepen the existing digital divide," says the Freedom House report.
In the crisis region of Kashmir, for example, India has been severely restricting access to information for a long time.
When the first resident tested positive for Covid-19 in Srinagar, the largest city in the Himalayan region, in January, the then mayor ordered the population to stay at home - but the news did not reach many.
Even the health workers in Kashmir were initially helpless and unenlightened, a doctor told Technologie Review magazine: "We had to ask people who were traveling outside of Kashmir to download medical manuals and bring printouts with them."
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Kashmiri journalists protest against internet bans
Photo: DANISH ISMAIL / REUTERS
Access to the Internet and digital skills are "critical" in the pandemic, according to a study by the "Capgemini Research Institute".
Governments should work more closely with think tanks, educational institutions, businesses and non-governmental organizations to reduce the digital divide.
In Argentina, for example, civil society organizations provide students with technical equipment and tutors.
And rural California students get free laptops and mobile Internet access.
Human rights activists and tech organizations are now calling on governments around the world to be more transparent about how corona tracking systems work and what happens to user data.
Signatories of an open letter want the Indonesian government to release the source code for the "PeduliLindeli" app for review, create a clear data protection policy and clarify whether there has been a recent data leak.
In Germany, the resistance from tech experts led to the development of a data protection-friendly Corona app.
Critics from authoritarian states, on the other hand, have little chance of taking action against new laws and other tightenings: Countries such as Zimbabwe suppress criticism and protests with repression - and justify their action by fighting the virus.
Irene Poetranto from the Citizen Lab also fears that many alarming developments can hardly be reversed: "We know from major events like the Olympic Games that many measures that are introduced in the name of security will remain in place afterwards," she says - and on the other hand, citizens are not even allowed to take to the streets during lockdowns.
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